Why didn't the writers kill off Leia when they had the chance?

IMO, for all that's worth, she should have made the sacrifice that the Laura Dern character did and kamikaze lightspeed into Snoke's flagship and go out with a bang, or just be killed when she got sucked into space.

But none of that happened.

So what are they going to do now?

Either Leia dies off screen and it's mentioned in the opening the opening crawl of the next film or it opens with her funeral. Lame and depressing note to start a film on.

Or they have a creepy CGI mannequin/waxwork of her for the next film. No thanks, it was bad enough in Rogue One.

Leia really deserved to have a good on screen death and go out with a bang, but it's hard to imagine how they might do anything decent with her now. Maybe they have enough out takes they can cobble something together with.