Is Elon Musk jealous? Engineer calls out SpaceX silence after NASA Artemis II launch success

SpaceX chief Elon Musk has often talked about human exploration and potential colonies in space. However, the tech billionaire has been relatively quiet about Nasa's Artemis II mission. And the internet may have a theory.

On April 1, 2026, Nasa’s Artemis II launched from Earth on a ten-day journey to the Moon. The first manned mission to the Moon in over 50 years. The buzz around Artemis II is high. More than 400,000 people attended the launch at the Nasa's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, USA. And social media is flooded with Artemis II as well. On YouTube, the launch gained over 17 million views. While many big names, such as Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Apollo 13 actor Tom Hanks, have commented on this mission, one individual has been inconspicuously quiet, SpaceX chief Elon Musk.

Musk is arguably one of the most vocal proponents of space exploration. He has often discussed the possibility of a colony on Mars in the near future. His company, SpaceX, has already challenged Nasa over relatively lower rocket costs with its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy reusable rockets. SpaceX is currently testing the Starship, which would be the most powerful rocket humanity has ever built.

Despite Musk’s keen interest in space exploration, he has not made any public comments on Artemis II. If you look at Elon’s X account, where he usually makes unfiltered remarks, there is no mention of Artemis II. But why is that? The internet might have a theory.

On X, an aerospace engineer, Christopher David shared a prediction he made five years ago. David stated back then, “By the way, Starship will never make it into orbit.” It appears that Christopher may be referring to a full orbital flight as the ship reached orbital velocity in March 2024. Christopher David shared his prediction on X.

In one comment, David explained the reason for his prediction. He added that the Starship was “too heavy. Both stages can't be reusable and still be able to put an appreciable payload into LEO (Low Earth Orbit).” A screenshot of the discussion from X.

One person wrote on David’s post, “It's strange how the Tesla/SpaceX Twittersphere seems very muted about the successful NASA Artemis launch.” The aerospace engineer claimed, “Yes. They're jealous.” Christopher David claimed that Elon Musk may be jealous of Artemis II.