One thing to note about the "500 hours of flight experience" and "1000 hours of flight experience" is that unless they break it down to "LIVE flight experience" the number is bullshit.
Flight simulator time is considered "flight experience" and has been for a couple decades. It's entirely possible both those pilots had less than a dozen hours of in air flight experience each.
Just sain'. Don't really know, or have any other comment regarding the allegation.