I fell over a link to a person who is so disgusted with the quality and accuracy of the media coverage of Musk that he has written a series of articles on the quality of that journalism and the impact it may have had, both on WM's comments about "Saint Musk" and the way Mrs S runs off at the mouth every time his name is mentioned.
There are several articles but I will number those which I believe tell a very interesting story and which implicate the kind of reporting I call the Daily Manipulate, the Gruniaad, Sky (no)News and the Biased Broadcasting Corporation.
Article1. Covers the so called "Blood Emeralds" story, the truth of that story (so far as it can be determined) and the quality, or lack of it, of the reporting in the press.
Article2. Is entitled "What's the full story behind Elon Musk's involvement with the Thai cave rescue effort?". It covers the actual, true, story of the involvement of Musk, SpaceX and Tesla and the way the press chose to present it at the time and the truth (or lack of it), being told by the press a the time.
Article3. Is a follow up article on the press response to Article 2 and some more in depth deep dive including the result of some interviews with SpaceX and Tesla staff who were involved at the time.
If you read absolutely nothing else, but do want to educate yourself about Musk; I recommend reading Article2 and dipping into Article3 and ripping down to "Tales Untold, Part 2" and read that.
Musk doesn't come out of it super well, he never could. I already said that he was never likely to be my bosom buddy, he's far too abrasive. But the Press. They come over as a bunch of slap dash internet trolls who couldn't be bothered to back check a juicy story dashed out in 20 minutes even if you paid them to do it.
I suspect that the reality of what Musk, SpaceX and Tesla did, during that cave rescue, played a very large part in the decision of the Californian court. Unsworth comes over as a loudmouthed overopinionated asshole who was also suffering sleep deprivation. Yes, certainly, Unsworth and the others carried out an almost impossible task under incredibly difficult circumstances. But that doesn't give him the right to be a total dick about something his own boss, the team leader of the rescue, had spent quite some time requesting and working with SpaceX and Musk on. Unsworth will have been almost completely unaware of the work that Musk and his companies did or the fact that they were requested to do so by the rescue lead, the Thai Navy and the Thai government; on several occasions.
Having spent several hours now reading and absorbing the information here, I feel wowed by the time and effort Jeremy Arnold put into this and the insights into the world of the press that he exposes.
Just to end this, this is not a canonisation piece for Musk. Arnold, when he wrote Article1, recommended that Unsworth should sue Musk and that if he did not have the money to do so, then money should be raised to help him and he, Arnold, felt that Musk should pay the penalty for lashing out in written form when, with a few hours of introspection, Musk might have not said anything at all.
Have a read, understand, put yourself in his Position. What would you have said? I would not have used the specific slur that Musk did but I would have reamed Unsworth out with as many choice, uniquely British, expletives and idioms as my vocab and google could avail me, until ran out of twitter characters. Then I'd have added a Pic with me wearing a T Shirt saying "Up yours you dick!"
Even more so because when you read all of this, Musk agreed to develop the Sub as Plan B Because it would probably not arrive before Plan A went into effect. Stanton, the rescue leader was extremely worried about the youngest child and his ability to survive the journey. It is not until you get into the Notes section of Article 3 that you read.
The OP may not have been able to see advantages to the sub over Plan A. That doesn’t mean there weren’t any. Two huge ones: (i) An insulated sub means no hypothermia. Given that hypothermia was a suspect in the death of the Thai SEAL, and given that the boys were much thinner and frailer, this is no small thing. (ii) If you read the accounts of the final leg of the rescue, particularly Jason Mallison’s (who was shepherding the smallest boy — the one who Stanton had mentioned to Musk as being the object of their concern), it’s a miracle that the child made it. The mask didn’t really fit, and the current was a constant threat to knock it off. Those concerns wouldn’t have been an issue within a contained capsule. (As I get into in more detail here, the US Air Force team leading the operation planning sold Plan A on the premise of 3-5 expected casualties, and felt optimistic even at that. Had the subs been there much earlier in the process, and had the golden window for getting the kids out via Plan A not been so narrow, why would the subs not have been tested?)
Musk continued with the development and even developed a second smaller model which was inflatable to be able to be manoeuvred through the choke points if required. That second development work only stopped when the last child was brought out.
So, yeah, let's support Unsworth and the main press. Musk was just a loudmouthed billionaire muscling in on real peoples work.
Or was he. Read the story. Or believe what you would like.
