Ditto
“The only difference this time was a very late track changewhich was not relayed to the crew.”
The waypoint was not where Captain Collins thought it was, but that had been the situation for two years: Previous crews were told that the waypoint was at McMurdo Station when in fact, it was 27 miles west. So it cannot be said that misinformation about the waypoint (and therefore the nav track) was the difference. All those who came back over the previous two years were also misinformed, albeit in a different way.
The first material difference was that the previous crews who went low on the basis that they were VMC had blue skies and were, in fact, VMC. They could see where they were going. They were not pretending.
The second material difference is that the previous crews did not use the AINS to go below MSA, firstly because it was not allowed, and secondly, because they were not pretending to be VMC. They could see where they were going.
The cloud issue never came up with previous crews, because the only time the McMurdo Station area was covered in cloud, the crew diverted to the South Magnetic Pole.