Weren't they going to originally have Dutch find the pod and have the brawl take place around it?
I always figured the ship detonated with Jungle Hunter's wrist gauntlet anyway.
As for transferring data/footage to the mothership, I like that concept. I feel like, with their technology, Jungle Hunter could probably transmit it from Earth to a ship in Earth's orbit with ease even, as opposed to sending back the pod, but either way I guess.
Something that always bugged me with P2 was that they had a rather large ship sitting in the city for, what we can at least assume to be, 2 months and no one noticed. Also how lame for the other predators to have to chill on the ship while City Hunter goes out to play.