Elon Musk calls diver from cave rescue 'pedo guy' in Twitter tirade
Elon Musk has lashed out at a British diver involved in the Thai cave rescue, labelling him a “pedo guy” on Twitter for criticising his submarine.
Mr Musk travelled to the Tham Luang cave with a six-foot submarine, which he said could be used to help free the 13 members of the Wild Boars soccer team after they became trapped on June 23. It was not used.
British diver Vern Unsworth told CNN the craft had “absolutely no chance of working”.
“He had no conception of what the cave passage was like,” he said.
“The submarine was about five foot six (inches) long, rigid, so it wouldn’t have gone ’round corners or ’round any obstacles. It wouldn’t have made the first fifty metres into the cave… just a PR stunt.”
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In response to the criticism, Mr Musk defended the submarine in a series of tweets.
The Tesla CEO tweeted he “never saw this British expat guy who lives in Thailand (sus) at any point when we were in the caves” and he only saw Thai military “who were great”.
Mr Musk continued, claiming the water level was low in cave five and the kids could have swum out and challenged Mr Van Unsworth to show the final rescue video.
“You know what, don’t bother showing the video,” he later tweeted.
“We will make one of the mini-sub/pod going all the way to Cave 5 no problem. Sorry pedo guy, you really did ask for it.”
Mr Unsworth lives in Chiang Rai. His knowledge of the cave system is said to be have been instrumental in the rescue of the boys and their 25-year-old coach.
He also told Thai authorities which divers would be needed to successfully complete the operation.
With The Independent and AAP
