Is Elon Musk’s ‘Starlink’ satellite the reason he’s keeping quiet over missing Titanic sub?

Not one to miss out on spitballing ideas in a crisis situation, Elon Musk has remained rather quiet on social media after news broke that the Titan, a tourist submersible used for $250,000 USD tours to the wreck of the Titanic, was not reachable after it’s voyage into the murky depths of the Atlantic ocean.

Many will recall that Musk had a plan involving submarines back in 2018 when he suggested using one custom built from his team in order to save the lives of a number of schoolchildren stuck in a Thai cave. That elicited the now well-remembered exchange between the Tesla, SpaceX and Twitter head calling Vern Unsworth, a British cave explorer, a “pedo” due to the explorer’s comments such a mission would not work

But in light of the recent rescue mission for the submersible, which has now seen rescuers expand their search area as “banging” had been heard from around the vicinity the vehicle last exchanged communications with, Musk has remained tight-lipped over the matter. Not even sharing rescue mission plans from the comfort of his Twitter profile.

That may have something to do with his involvement in previous excursions to the wreckage of the Titanic, and perhaps the poor optics of his involvement he would rather avoid answering questions about. Reports have suggested that the communication equipment, which ultimately failed when the submersible containing among others British businessman Hamish Harding, was using the Starlink to relay their communications.

Starlink is the world's first and largest satellite constellation using a low Earth orbit, and is owned and operated by SpaceX - the company that Elon Musk made his name with after successes with what we now call PayPal. Initially used to provide internet services as part of SpaceX’s plans to launch, it expanded to also include cellular capabilities, which recently were used to aid in the communication efforts in the Ukraine after Russia’s illegal occupation.

That the timeline of events regarding the missing submersible do hinge on when the communications between the vessel and the submarine used for the submersible to dock into failed between the two, the most scrutinous of media outlets are now asking whether Musk’s lack of correspondence regarding the matter is an indication regarding information about the submersible that isn’t public knowledge or if it is an admission that Starlink ultimately failed and led to the rescue efforts now taking place in the Atlantic Ocean.