Originally Posted by Ian W
The crew probably knew it wouldn't as the fire crew outside would have reported that the fire was at the engine and outboard and all smoke and fire was blowing away from the fuselage. They may even have added advice not to evacuate to give them full access to put the fire out. The examples you quote are precisely the opposite with fire being blown onto the fuselage.
In the below picture despite the favorable cross wind from the left, the soot goes right up to the corner of the TE Flap cutout in the wing and the entire Flap appears to be trashed. That is all well inboard of the engine pylon.
Then there is the non-linearity factor that fires exhibit. One minute you are fighting a localized fire, the next instant something explodes in your face like the wing on the Emirates T7. No one can really predict exactly how a particular fire is going to behave in advance. They are as predictable as a pet rattlesnake.