- Especially with an 8-knot tailwind, as was posted earlier. Why didn't they backtrack? Wouldn't you, if you were full to the gunnels, suspected the load sheet may be 'optimistic', and knew you'd require every foot of tarmac available to you?
If you look at the airport layout, you'll see that they needed to backtrack anyway, even if they took off in the opposite direction. (i.e. With a headwind) So in principle, you have a valid point.
BUT.....
Taking off towards the northeast means that you will overfly the city, instead of flat rural terrain. And that would not be possible, as they would not have enough height to clear all the roofs.
They would have ploughed through Mainstreet.
From this set of circumstances I would conclude that this "operator" knew what they were doing, and that they were cutting corners in a big way.
Despite the tailwind, they departed toward the southwest. They needed the clear flyout space without obstacles, so that the ground effect would help them. They did this before several times and knew what was needed to get away with it.