I am incredibly confused by this.

Is it normal that the winning bidders get reimbursed for their incurred bidding costs immediately?
Especially since they will have to finance SAS anyway once successful? This seems incredibly weird to me. Especially if the deal is not to go through I don't understand why SAS would cover these costs? It seems that the risk of the deal falling through (perhaps due to regulatory intervention) is placed wholly on the SAS side here. Isn't the bidder supposed to put down a deposit?

This whole thing just seems silly.

It appears to me that SAS is trying to undermine the Chapter 11 process in which a counter bid could be presented to the court directly.