[icelancer]

Spacewalks are neither free nor totally safe either. It is possible they calculated that the risk of a spacewalk and the time it would take to do that was worse than attempting re-entry. They were probably wrong, but it's not a free operation.

[WillPostForFood]

With hindsight, we can say they were definitely wrong.

[icelancer]

Only if you look at things deterministically, which is usually the incorrect approach. It was almost certainly wrong. But you are working with incomplete information.