The article said no attempt at ejection. The odds of both failing is close to zero and they must have had them - unless they were sitting on wood crates.
When things go bad at very low altitude, there are often just a few seconds to figure out what is happening and how to respond. I know of several cases where the WSO got out but the 0.8 second delay (going from memory and my last flight was 1989) meant the pilot died. I was a WSO. Never needed to eject, thankfully!
Thank you for your WSO service! I worked aircraft instrumentation.
Re the article said there was no attempt to eject. How would they know? I guess the seats didn’t fire and come out but did they pull the handles? We’ll probably never know.
And please remind me: I believe if the pilot pulled the handle, the WSO went as well, in fact, first as you said. But if the WSO pulled the handle first, did the pilot also go, after the 0.8 sec. delay? I think not but please correct me if I’m wrong.