With time at a premium, Elon Musk made public his plan for his team to quickly design a mini-sub to help rescue the young soccer players and their coach. On July 6, 2018, just days after the Thai children and their coach were trapped, Musk tweeted that engineers from his company were headed to Thailand. One day later, he outlined his plans for a small mini-sub that could be carried by divers and transport the children to safety.
To Musk’s credit, his team designed, built, and tested the mini-sub in a matter of hours and had it in Thailand less than one day later, but it was never used, as Vox notes. Musk’s efforts were also not equally welcomed by everyone involved in the effort. Notably, Vernon Unsworth, a U.K. caver involved in the operation, characterized Musk’s involvement as a PR stunt to CNN. In response to Unsworth’s comment, Musk lashed out on Twitter, as Vox reports.
