A SpaceX team is being brought in to overhaul FAA's air traffic control system
theverge.com
theverge.com
Just feels like corruption, tbh.
The problem statement is: I don't own this yet. And the goal is: I run everything now.
It IS blatant corruption. A foreign national is using his private enterprises to take over government agencies and is backed by a traitor who only cares about his own money and power.
If there ever was a more blatant episode of corruption it's what's going on in the US right now.
"Fuck you!" Musk shouted back.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/data-scientist-resigned-twitter-b...
Musk is not a terribly bright individual. He gets a lot of things wrong, and he does not care to be told he is wrong.
None?
> What was the bidding process like?
What bidding process? Remember when it's the "special WH employee" hiring his own company that's all fine and dandy
> Is there a problem statement beyond "it has some old bits"? What are the specific goals?
Every system can be improved, but I think the current issues with ATC in the US are not of a technical nature per se
ATC is much more than controllers watching planes on radar screens
Also remember this is a system that has been continuously evolving since WWII pretty much (and possibly before) and that one of the recent "breaking backwards compatibility" was NDBs being decommissioned in the US (bit by bit)
Source that SpaceX was hired for this? The article makes no such claims and has no sources saying that.
> get a firsthand look at the current system, learn what air traffic controllers like and dislike about their current tools, and envision how we can make a new, better, modern and safer system
based on this they can come in to scope out a project and send it out for bidding
"According to Musk, the efficiencies gained by leveraging the exposure of the assessment team make SpaceX the only viable vendor. 'A bidding process to select the only possible applicant would be silly.'"
If a democrat did this, it would (rightly!) be seen as a front-page scandal on the scale of Teapot Dome if not worse.
There's already been a handful of impeachment-level events, such as the blatant quid pro quo of the Adams corruption charges dismissal which resulted in a series of DoJ resignations reminiscent of the Saturday Night Massacre. You know, a critical event that shifted public and Republican opinion of Nixon, leading to his resignation under the threat of impeachment.
Democratic congresspeople and senators can't do much without at least some of their Republican colleagues standing up to the bullies currently running the party.
And no, Susan Collins' inevitable but ineffectual "concerns" isn't the kind of outrage I mean.
All of the people with balls have been fired or quit.
North Carolina senator Thom Tillis told people that the FBI warned him about “credible death threats” when he was considering voting against Pete Hegseth’s nomination. - Vanity Fair, “They’re Scared Shitless”
To whatever degree they are really scared (Liz Cheney is far braver than these MAGA elected kooks, scared of their own shadows), let's accept the premise for the sake of the argument. They will permit an incendiary fire of epic proportion well beyond what we've seen so far before they do anything. They may in fact not be capable of it under any circumstances. And if that is the case, is there even a functioning Senate right now? In terms of 5 USC 3331? I think not. And that means the republic is in abeyance. It's a principate now. For however long, really depends on the American public - not any elected officials.
According to Trump, yes. This is what he said:
> When I land in my plane, privately, I use a system from another country because...I won't tell you what country... because the captain says this system is so bad, it's so obsolete, that we can't have that.
- https://www.forbes.com/sites/suzannerowankelleher/2025/02/06...
> Trump ... seemed to mix up a plane’s onboard electronics system with the federal air traffic control system.
Fits in with the first term in which Trump baffled airline executives by assuring them that he'd help solve the problem with the airports giving them the wrong equipment[1], also based on apparently failing to understand an anecdote from his private pilot
There is actually a very long term project to modernise US ATC (less on safety grounds and more on congestion minimization grounds) it's even one in which theoretically a satellite constellation operator could have some involvement as a data provider. But but it's something of an understatement to suggest that this is unlikely to be advanced by an administration lead by someone who thinks he understands aviation based on misunderstanding his pilot and someone whose first foray into improving the FAA was to arbitrarily fire hundreds of FAA staff and whose main goal for the FAA is to deregulate space launches...
[1]https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/briefings-statements/re...
400 non-ATC, non-safety related probationary new hires, out of 45,000.
Does this strike you as the approach of an administration that knows what its doing and cares deeply about safety?
It's recently been revealed that not only does the FAA require a "biography" of its ATC applicants, but have even been coaching black candidates how to use the keywords that will allow their applications to float to the top.
If the agency and the politicians overseeing it cared about safety, shouldn't they try to hire the best and the brightest, not the under-represented minorities that they have been struggling to hire in recent years? Meanwhile, White applicants who were fully qualified have been bypassed.
I personally don't care, and I suspect most thinking people don't care, what the ethnicity or gender are of the people in the towers. But we all care very deeply that they should be the very best of the best.
The govt can be paying those folks directly or Musk himself can be paying them like he did for some DOGE team members.
Significant improvement in cost and capabilities over competition that enabled SpaceX to capture so much of the market has massively driven prices down and certainly saved taxpayers a lot of money for the services.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_launch_market_competitio...
SpaceX does get government grants of course like most companies. It's by far not most of their revenue though, and generally competitively available and tied to particular goals. Investing and supporting in high tech, high value industries like this is often a good thing and returns more than cost to the country, as it certainly has with SpaceX. So it's the opposite of pockets getting emptied.
Sounds like the ideal government...
Tesla stock roughly doubled following the election! That's obviously not because Trump is going to be a champion for electric vehicles and green energy, he couldn't be more hostile to them. Investors know that Elon is going to suck insane amounts of money out of the government with his new level of access and most of that will flow through his companies.
If SpaceX has the best, most economical, and safest route to space, why would Nasa and DoD not use them? Who else is there? Blue Origin's not there yet; others are in the works but not there yet. SpaceX is proven; it does a good job and has brought manned space flight back to the U.S. Has nothing to do with whether Musk & his team are close to Trump or not.
More to the point, the DoGE audits are projected to save the federal government hundreds of billions of dollars, which should significantly reduce the deficit which is currently projected at two trillion dollars.
Even if we assume the worst, most absurd and political stance that Musk is in it for the money and influence, saving $500 billion or more is still worth it. And, in reality, Musk's political activity is costing Tesla a lot of sales; Tesla's sales numbers are in decline, actually.
Oh come the fuck on. Projected by whom? If they are looking to reduce the deficit, why are they floating tax breaks that will cost the country billions?
Have some skepticism, will you?
Not billions: trillions!
"Trump Tax Priorities To Cost $5 to $11 Trillion over the next Ten Years"
https://www.crfb.org/blogs/trump-tax-priorities-total-5-11-t...
Read Milton Friedman, not anti-Trump hit pieces that predict disaster.
Building software which respect to probabilistic risk analysis. This includes techniques such as abstract interpretation and theorem for for the logic of dynamical system etc. I guess spacex expertise in these realm is quite advanced and they do something useful.
Anyway this is the least concern of what the Trump admin is doing. They siding with Russia putting America's carefully crafted world order down the drain. Read: winter is coming - garry kasparov
And they can't just rip it out and replace it, that would likely cripple airlines. Which may be by design of course, but why would they want their own people to no longer be able to fly?
You mean: "killing people"?
The Verge is... often a nauseating experience because between every line they're hammering a side-hustle point with blunt force.
Duffy: "I’m asking for help from any high-tech American developer or company that is willing to give back to our country..."
Duffy: "...learn what air traffic controllers like and dislike about their current tools, and envision how we can make a new, better, modern and safer system....Zero air traffic controllers and critical safety personnel were let go"
Sounds like they're asking air traffic controllers what they need. I doubt Musk will storm in with kitchen sink, light a cigar and put his boots up on the console.
Procurement bids should be transparent and avoid the illusion of conflict. This is the complete opposite of that. It's hard to take Musk's campaign against "fraud and waste" serious when he's awarding the contracts to himself.
I think this move is a mistake, but what your describing there is just competent management.
Political pettiness, and speculation about whether Musk got some special favor or advantage that would not be available to other companies aside, it doesn't seem like a bad idea to get cross-pollination and share ideas with other organizations and fields. SpaceX may not know much about ATC but they probably do know something about monitoring and control and collision avoidance in rockets and satellites.
What I wrote stands though, the article seems poorly sourced and incorrect about its interpretation of the tweet.
It's been reported that 400 new hires on probationary status were let go. None of them were involved in safety related operations. The FAA has around 45,000 total employees, so it's a rather tiny percentage, in any case.
[1]https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/publications/controller_staf... [2] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-faa-cuts-minimum-flight-... [3]https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/faa-nomin... [4] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/over-90-percent-u-s-airport-tow...
Trump administration fires and then tries to rehire nuclear weapons workers in DOGE reversal https://www.cbsnews.com/news/doge-firings-us-nuclear-weapons...
USDA accidentally fired officials working on bird flu and is now trying to rehire them https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/doge/usda-accidentally-fire...
And some strong evidence that DOGE is rewriting government databases to cover their tracks: https://xcancel.com/electricfutures/status/18920196528358073... (Note how petty this is - DOGE appears to be falsifying data rather than publicly admitting they were wrong! I assume Elon is personally responsible, just like Trump personally drew on the map with a Sharpie.)
Congress, courts - silence.
Everyone suddenly is afraid to speak. Pretty sad.
- Does anyone here at HN stand for this action?
- If so, do you think there's a conflict of interest? How do stand on this possible conflict?
> ...look at the current system, learn what air traffic controllers like and dislike about their current tools, and envision how we can make a new, better, modern and safer system.
Do you think there is anything wrong?
I have to admit I get a bit of a knee-jerk reaction about even the appearance of conflict of interest, but if money isn't changing hands then I can't see a problem really. Regulators regularly collaborate with stakeholders, so why not experts in peripheral / somewhat related fields?
And really, conflict of interest seems to not matter in the slightest in American politics, what with senators and bureaucrats and their spouses etc getting enormous grants and setting up "non-profits", there must be an enormous list of concerning conflicts worse than this.
And new systems are so few and far between because of the layers of safety and regulation testing that must be met. Though it sounds like those may be reduced in the name of efficiency.
I’ve seen corrupt and broken contracts. The English is very reasonable.
People make lots of effort to make strange behavior look normal.
Hell - I know that the right sounding clause can basically buy you a full month of televised debate, where people point to the trees and miss the forest.
Why the heck does the president go to Mar A Lago ? His own hotel? And get the government to pay them ?
How the heck is it ok, for the second in command to bring his own team in?
Because it’s in America and this can’t be corruption?
American exceptionalism was built on overcoming basic mediocrity- and it would never stand for such an obvious conflict of interest.
TLDR: of course the language is going to sound good. What do people think the clauses will say ?
“Herein I take an oath that my actions are 100% corrupt?”
Obviously not.
I personally view the action of giving a task to a company (SpaceX) that is legally under the oversight of the regulator (FAA) whose inner systems are to be overhauled - without contest - as problematic.
But maybe that's just cultural...
"an uncontrolled re-entry of the Falcon 9 rocket's second stage occurred between 04:46 and 04:48 on February 19, 2025, over Poland".
> get a firsthand look at the current system, learn what air traffic controllers like and dislike about their current tools, and envision how we can make a new, better, modern and safer system
> [media] will claim Elon’s team is getting special access, let me make clear that the @FAANews regularly gives tours of the command center to both media and companies
I don't understand how anyone can be reasonably against this? They are not going to just overhaul everything overnight, they are going to upgrade the system based on ATC feedback.
in Air Traffic Control? At SpaceX? Do tell . . .
These aren't the same domains.
That technical nitpick aside, this is a classic business move whereby a preferred and privileged private operator gets exclusive ground floor access to get in on a leech like remora attachment to a spigot of public funds for decades.
That's the corruption part, not the touchy feely first phase "just some experts having a look".
You must be lost? Please take your Musk derangement syndrome somewhere else.
reddit.com
The first assumption to examine is the one where you assume that the speaker is credible.
They do not what they say they will do.
They do not listen. They destroy.
They do not take responsibility, they point fingers.
You're clearly not able to think straight because you're too biased.
Space X has about a dozen different military, security and space contracts with the US gov, at least 7 of them under Biden.
Let's assume that the person isn't so full of it that the sclera of their eyes aren't dark brown.
What guarantees that Musk's team is the best to do this on-time, on-budget, and on-spec?
SpaceX has been a government contractor for years, consistently delivering innovative solutions, reducing costs, and achieving milestones that traditional aerospace companies struggled with.
Biden alone assigned 4 national security contract to Space X during his term, a notable one being NSSL.
Cool. What about that says they'll have expertise in clearing up issues with ATC?
Was a call for proposals even made? Were requirements even defined?
The system is largely developed by Lockheed, Raytheon and Thales (all defense contractors). If there's a legal issue with SpaceX doing this I'm sure you'll hear about it.
I don't understand how anyone can reasonably pretend this is okay. Elon Musk + the birthright citizenship order + Eric Adams means Donald Trump is by far the most corrupt president in American history.