This is naked corruption. It's way worse than just stealing the contract, it essentially means Starlink will get a free antenna on every airplane in the country (at taxpayer expense?) and will then have the airlines as captive customers. Musk is going to make way more than $2bn out of this.
Don't forget the 44 billion USD he paid to control one of the world's largest vehicles for dissemination of information, transforming it into a superspreader of disinformation and propaganda.
Does it strike anyone else as sadly funny that the country which has meddled in other countries for so long, has finally had a foreign puppet + stooge installed in itself?
Obligation to have a starlink terminal on the plane to enable communication with the radio tower. This comes with the added bonus of enabling Elon to sell Starlink internet in-flight.
Prescribed users will get access to net and non-users will get forked as per-usual. But with an Elon branded fork instead.
I also expect he's eager to make it proprietary. That way it would then force all other airlines that route through the USA to have a Starlink terminals too.
I use a mini in-flight. I welcome anything to bring the price down (currently $250/mo for 50 GB)
However, this "fix" not being put out for bid is ridiculous. That's not how competition and the market works. This feels like African-style "whatchu gonna do about it" big man corruption.
I'm gonna say this every time this comes up: These people should be in PRISON. They are criminals. If we care about law and order, we must remove them immediately from office. End of story. I am sick and tired of apologists for these people, if you believe they are conducting themselves legally, you do not believe in our Republic, you are complicit, you are a traitor to our country and to the American project. We will find you with our pitchforks, it is only a matter of time.
Going forward I think we can assume that conflict of interest doesn't exist anymore. No DEI but they'll replace it with nepotism and full on corruption.
The genius move by Trump is doing full on corruption out in the open leaves people confused. Full corruption, foreign brides/influence, blatant political favors are the norm now. I remember when the MAGAs complained about Hilary's emails and Hunter on the board of some company. Now we have a full on corruption out in the open and no one gives a shit.
This is the true secret of American government, though. We do everything that every other corrupt government does, except we've managed to legalize it.
The new administration just cut 400 jobs at the FAA [1], and now Musk will directly pocket the "savings" to "work" on some bullshit useless tech. When Musk talks "waste and bloat", he means public money that doesn't end up in his pocket.
As a result, air traffic is noticeably more dangerous, and many lost their livelihoods in these increasingly uncertain times, just to make the wealthiest man on Earth a bit more wealthy. The "Fell for it Again Award" goes to...
Even with the proper contract awarding process, corruption is widespread.
Decisions made at lunches and then the contract award process skewed to award the correct person, at some insane markup over real market prices for the same service.
The process is unfixable. Instead we should just look at a teams total cost and total achievement every year, and if the money they've spent doesn't look good value for money, we give them a bad performance review and their government career will be tricky to repair.
That is a far stronger incentive to get the most out of taxpayer money than ever stricter, yet super easy to game, anti corruption measures.
Unfortunately this doesn’t work either. Contracting is risk adverse and tries to avoid legal battles at all costs so even bad reviews often get scrubbed and edited until they look glowing.
The risk adverse nature of the govt needs to be fixed before the incentives align.
Do any governments employ a competitive approach to awarding contracts that isn't winner-take-all? If there were a way to build an ATC system utilizing both Verizon and Starlink we might get the benefits of price competition and redundancy.
Yes. The US does this with some larger programs ("systems of systems") if the components are sufficiently distinct. An aircraft? Not so much. A comms system? Absolutely, if it's not sold as one complete system. For instance, radios might be contracted to multiple vendors with the intent to drive down cost.
It's not universally done, though. It depends on how the program office(s) involved decide to run things.
EDIT: To expand. Look at space systems. The ground stations are not tied to specific space systems (though some space systems develop their own ground networks), that is a separate program from the satellites and SOCs. There is no one "space program". And even for a particular satellite system the SOC may be under a separate contract vehicle than the satellite itself.
Isn't the logical way to do that for a contractor to make a bid intending to use multiple subcontractors to provide a better service than any one contractor could provide alone?
Right, that's similar to the radio example I gave (multiple vendors so that there was no single point of failure, it mitigated risk and, in theory, reduces cost by introducing competition). What I meant by aircraft though was that for a specific aircraft, it'll be run by a specific contractor for all or nearly all its subcomponents. Though there could be exceptions. See the way that heavies (cargo, AWACS, and the like) are given multiple missions and some of the mission specific components may be separate programs rather than executed by the prime for the aircraft. But you won't have the government contract for the engine and the airframe separately.
Though you also have that done for aircraft. The F-35 was selected among several aircraft that were being developed by various contractors as the one to move forward as the JSF. This is where the lifecycle of a program comes into play. In the R&D stages you'll see multiple options quite commonly because they want to compete different vendors. Eventually it whittles down to one for things like aircraft to move forward. Though, using the JSF as an example, maybe they should select multiple. LM were the geniuses that thought you could increase software productivity by hiring more programmers and having them work in shifts.
Given the systemic corruption elsewhere, I can’t summon anger about this until I can verify if the utility is necessary and uniquely provided by Starlink. If so, then this is just bad optics. If not, it should be aggressively fought.
It’s a 15 year contract awarded in 2023 so it may be too early to tell. The strongest public claims that Verizon isn’t capable comes from their competitor so those claims should probably be taken with a boulder of salt until more information is made available.
Is the "Moving fast and breaking things" attitude commonly associated with these types of companies compatible with ATC?
While I acknowledge their success in space, a LOT of guardrails/regulation were placed upon them to assure safe progress. Now they're both running the regulatory agency while also providing the end-product, which may mean faster progress but less safety overall.
Air travel is, generally, safe. The US has an issue with low staffing levels in ATC, and while automated systems have helped, the workload is still too high. It will likely be years before a Starlink product would come online, so staffing levels need to be addressed in the near-term.
Not to mention the early model was built on govt contracts because the govt was the only institution capable of shouldering the risk of an unproven space vendor.
Not saying that’s a bad thing, just that the success of SpaceX and the govt were tightly coupled.
Interestingly, it looks like the “BEAD program” - a rural broadband initiative was allocated more funding ($42b) than SpaceX and Tesla combined ($37b).
That last number includes loans, too.
I chose that example in particular because Starlink has done more for rural broadband access than everything else the federal government has done combined.
I agree Starlink is poised to be very successful at providing high speed internet to rural areas. But that doesn’t negate the point that it required the govt to do so because SpaceX would not exist if it didn’t get high risk govt contracts. Also, I wouldn’t compare it to terrestrial internet unless you advocate it being a regulated utility in the same way, which I doubt Musk or investors would want. Different rules, different constraints.
Elon is exactly the person to want to rewrite things from scratch and break shit. Hopefully, a drop in air travel due to safety fears leads to the workload decreasing, thereby allowing these forced system upgrades to happen with less harm.
While I don’t like the way it is handled, I’m going to be a contrarian here and say this could be a good thing. Previously, the contract was awarded to Verizon at the same price. I have more faith in SpaceX’s ability to deliver than Verizon and if starlink antennas are on every plane, aircraft internet will likely be better overall as a side effect.
Please convince me why this view is incorrect, I am open to listen.
You're making those assertions with no absolutely no data though. In a sane, non-corrupt system a trusted third party with recognised industry experience would assess the contract, what has been agreed to and what been delivered and make an evaluation based on the cost, risk, timetables etc. None of that happened here. It's just naked corruption.
What you are talking about is a pure theory and never exist in real world. Start with trusted 3rd party - trusted by who?
Starlink technologically can provide better connectivity in terms of speed and reliability compared to Verizon (can doesn’t mean it will of course). So there is some credibility to the decision.
But of course populace prefer to focus on flamboyant personalities instead of “based on cost, risk, timetables” ain’t it?
The existing system is already corrupt so I don’t think that hypothetical is helpful here. The process by which contracts are awarded is already unfair and biased towards certain players with the right connections to get a contract written in a way that only they can fulfill.
It’s possible, although I have not verified, that the contract was written in such a way that Verizon was the only qualified applicant because of lobbying.
The concern is specifically the way it is handled, though?
So, could bad things still lead to good things? Of course. Do we generally accept "ends justifies the means"? I didn't think so?
As for downsides, I confess the five year life cycle of the satellites is of some concern to me. Seems more so of a problem the more of them you have to put up there?
Arbitrary power can achieve a lot of good things but it always ends the same way. So better WiFi on the plane but one day you find you can't get on a plane anymore because you said the wrong thing.
Isn't that already how it works? At least for specific values of "the wrong thing" - one day you find you can't get on a plane because you said "I want to blow up this plane."
But also "I am going to Colombia to bring some cocaine home." and "I am going to Washington to assassinate the president." and "The right of the people to keep and bear nuclear bombs shall not be infringed." and any number of other things that don't immediately threaten the plane's integrity.
Bans from planes are already arbitrary and capricious, so I don’t think changing which arbitrary power is responsible really makes a difference here. Look at all the news articles of people ending up on the no fly list for garbage grounds.
What’s the tradeoff between reliability/cost/performance between different infrastructure approaches? I’d assume for safety critical applications, reliability is the priority.
Can't give real answers without data on Starlink reliability (or non-consumer features), but personally as someone who depended on ATC both as small time pilot and more regularly as passenger, I'd be wary of sat radio as main backhaul.
Of course Verizon can fsck it up as well, but multiple leased fiber lines, possibly direct MPLS with guarantees on latency and bandwidth, or maybe even DWDM between major locations sounds more reliable to my instincts.
Most importantly I don't trust the hatchet job way this is done, not just on Starlink use, but the whole hatchet job with FAA.
With density of flights in USA, intra-ATC Comms are non trivial part of safety - passing flight information on structured messages rather than by hand between areas is... More than important.
I haven't before, but due to certain private interests I can explain what they mean by "legacy copper TDM infrastructure".
A lot of interconnections between US ATC services were done back with the good old Bell System over then new T1/T3 digital carriers, plus analog leased lines in some cases, that provided high reliability and high quality of service links for both data and voice (which could include voice connection to remote radio transceivers).
This is, of course, being phased out even from "compatibility mode" setups where you get old style trunks that are backed by newer infrastructure. So the network infrastructure is literally dying out.
A comparable setup with modern tech would be MPLS fiber backbone with capacity reservation (thus actually getting stable latency and bandwidth guarantees), which would allow creation of virtual meshes with different QoS requirements that would provide both stable voice service (including from centralized ATC to remote radar transceivers), guaranteed performance data links (for example for radars etc), slower but still guaranteed service bulk data transfers, etc.
I might have also mentioned DWDM, which essentially lets you create a physical fiber optic path where switching is done by optical elements based on frequency of the signal (so you can pack multiple signals into one fiber then route them to different ports etc. etc.) - very useful if you want no variability in connection while still be able to reroute them fast.
That exactly is the point of the program. A shift to an IP network.
Where Starlink comes in is in the intermediate step. Before Verizon finishes running their MPLS network, there's a program called RTRI that provides an off ramp for TDM, so when Lumen stops serving, they have something. It's contracted to L3Harris and runs over SDWAN while using any network as an overlay. Satellite (including GEO), Cable and 5G (anything available really)
Sidestepping the corruption piece, which is a huge problem here to be clear, my understanding is that SpaceX has promised to provide starlink antennas at no cost to be used in commercial aircraft. Assuming that is true (again, a big if), then wouldn’t a natural consequence here be Starlink back Internet on the planes?
That said, I may have been reading misinformation and it’s only provided to ATC towers.
They wouldn't be used for ATC though. Internet access from aircraft is, outside of questions whether it interferes with aircraft operations, outside of FAA purview (at most, it's FCC and ITU-T depending scope)
> I have more faith in SpaceX’s ability to deliver than Verizon
Why? Verizon has been delivering top of the line cellular service for multiple decades now. Starlink is quite new on the scene and given that they’ve now captured management of the agency they’re selling to, they have no incentive to actually provide high quality service. They could do a shitty job and keep the contract, so why would they bother to do well?
> They could do a shitty job and keep the contract, so why would they bother to do well?
I think this is probably the key piece I didn’t consider. SpaceX’s previous work was done under heavy competitive pressure so they had to do good. Here it doesn’t matter what they do.
With Verizon, my doubts came from all of the reporting that’s happened on rural broadband funding. A lot of the companies, including Verizon, essentially took the money and ran without doing all of the work (from my understanding).
In concerns such as this, the process matters. If we don't follow it this time, then why follow next time or the time after? Then, if this rule or that law doesn't matter, then do any of them matter?
I think people would have been more comfortable if they decided to send it out to bid again - not great since it was already awarded, but at least going back through the public process.
Why would it be better? If you can cancel your competitors contracts and award them to yourself, the only incentive you have is to just...raise the price.
Yep obviously Verizon is a bloated company with zero innovation and no particular experience relevant to the FAA. Meanwhile SpaceX has experience in software, hardware, telecom, and flight. I trust them more with modernizing the FAA.
There’s also very little information on who else bid for this contract that Verizon got. How do we know it wasn’t corrupt to begin with, especially with Biden engaging in lawfare against Musk and doing bizarre things like excluding him from EV summits? The entire FAA modernization plan looks corrupt - everyone else that got contracts are random unknown companies. I bet they have ties back to some congressman.
If we think that, isn't the solution to reopen the bidding with more transparency, rather than hand it to the guy who just so happens to both be in charge of the team pushing for this and owns the company the new contract is awarded to?
Your replacing "maybe this was corrupt", with 'this is blatantly and obviously corrupt"
I can't think of anything much more corrupt than someone in government directing a government contract to a vendor they own with no process for considering other vendors. If that seems fine to you, then I don't think we'll ever agree on what corruption looks like.
If Starlink is actually "very likely to be better for taxpayers" it should have no problem going through the normal bidding process competing with other vendors.
Even giving the benefit of the doubt that they would do a good job: The ends do not justify the means. That's really all it is. Pragmatically speaking, Americans simply abhor an unelected hundred-billionaire who behaves in a mean, trollish, and "hateable" manner, forcing himself into the institutions of their home country in a way that appears destructive and careless. For each individual case, whether it actually ends up improved by some metric (and whether Elon is even actively involved) is overshadowed ten-fold by the societal damage caused, the dangerous precedent created, and the fighting spirit of Americans against authoritarianism.
Leaving aside the corruption thing there could be a lot to be said for satellite coms for aircraft and air traffic control as air traffic is global and the only way to have a system that will work anywhere including over oceans is satellite really.
SpaceX changed the rules of the game - before SpaceX we all used stationary satellites, needed to point antennas to them, deal with atrocious latencies and low bandwidths.
The enabling technology is constellations in low orbit and SpaceX isn't the only one anymore.
Put aside the Musk hatred. Maybe the company that has 8k satellites in orbit and can bring internet to anywhere in the world, is a better fit than a cell phone company?
Not much more to say, really. There's blatant conflict of interest going on, but I guess we're way past that. Four next years is going to be a non-stop firehose of grift, good thing they won't even bother to hide it.
It kind of doesn't matter if this is the best choice or not. If Elon wants to occupy the position he does in the government, he needs to remove his companies from the pool of government contracts.
I like DOGE's stated objectives. I like SpaceX, and Starlink. They probably ARE a better choice than Verizon. It doesn't matter.
That being said, do I think that bankers and defense contractors and tech companies and oil execs etc have not bought their way into similarish positions of influence for the last many decades? Probably. But Elon's power at the moment feels far less bounded and far more arbitrary.
Verizon has a valid solid network when you're outside of the consumer network. In the business world, Verizon is actually pretty decent and very established. Verizon business is very different to Verizon consumer.
It does matter, imo. You don't want planes to lose communication with base. Satellite has its faults and his ISP has only been around for five years.
Here are the facts regarding the situation with Starlink, the FAA, and the Verizon contract as of February 28, 2025:
The FAA awarded Verizon a $2.4 billion contract in 2023 to upgrade its air traffic control communication system, known as the FAA Enterprise Network Services (FENS) program.
As of February 27, 2025, reports indicate the FAA is considering canceling this contract and potentially shifting the work to Starlink, a SpaceX subsidiary owned by Elon Musk.
The FAA has not finalized this decision, stating "no decisions have been made" about the Verizon contract.
Currently, the FAA is testing three Starlink terminals: one in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and two at non-safety-critical sites in Alaska.
Elon Musk has claimed the existing Verizon system (though later corrected to an L3Harris system) is failing rapidly, posing risks to air travelers, and that Starlink is providing terminals "at no cost to the taxpayer on an emergency basis." The FAA has not publicly confirmed this risk assessment.
SpaceX employees are working within FAA facilities, assisting with technology upgrades, amid a broader Trump administration effort to modernize the agency.
The process to unwind a federal contract and reassign it typically requires a competitive bidding process or justification under specific legal exceptions (e.g., national security or urgent public interest), which has not been publicly detailed in this case.
These aren't the facts sorry. The program is still going to Verizon, but there's a transition from TDM to IP called RTRI. That's where Starlink comes in. It's run by L3Harris, not SpaceX.
it seems like US govt always either 180s from the previous president, or morphs into it's last enemy, in one way or another.
Osama, Obama
Russian Oligarchy, American Oligarchy
I almost expect a Putinesque invasion of a 'threatening' nation, maybe Cuba, or somewhere around the south-east-asian sea (the so-called south-china sea), or maybe rotten Denmark if they won't give up Greenland.
I see a lot of pessimism here which makes me think Elon Musk is right when he says they are just having some fun and people lack a sense of humor. Cheer up, people! Geez. /s
In the mid 90s, I recall talking to some of the people working on the current scheme to modernize ATC. This was the 3rd or 4th attempt, and billions had already been spent.
Since then, there have been many efforts and many more billions spent. I'm sure all of these efforts went through the proper channels, etc, but all that has shown is that (a) FAA has no clue how to manage these contracts, and (b) the normal way of doing this absolutely doesn't work.
In contrast, this is how civil infrastructure used to get done in the US:
>Start from that price, and then figure out what service you can offer with that money.
I say this not to attack you personally, but because I can't think of any other way to describe this idea (and I do realize that this does not contribute to a high quality discussion)...
Approaching something as vital and complicated as air traffic safety by saying, "I will only take the services I can get for some completely arbitrary amount of money," is utterly fucking stupid.
Dude, $800k won't even pay for a new piston single. That's like three ATC salaries.
I don't know where you get the idea that this is enough money. It's not, it's absurdly low, and "half an on-call" to stop airplanes from crashing when your Node.js app crashes sounds more like a joke than a serious proposal.
This is naked corruption. It's way worse than just stealing the contract, it essentially means Starlink will get a free antenna on every airplane in the country (at taxpayer expense?) and will then have the airlines as captive customers. Musk is going to make way more than $2bn out of this.
The US government put itself up for sale. Musk bought it. Now he's reaping the rewards of his investment.
Starting to feel like Russia’s fire sale to oligarchs after the fall of the USSR.
He paid $270M or something to be the de-facto President. An excellent deal.
Don't forget the 44 billion USD he paid to control one of the world's largest vehicles for dissemination of information, transforming it into a superspreader of disinformation and propaganda.
"He". There are Russians and Saudis behind the funding (to no-one's surprise), the same countries that have bankrolled Trump for decades.
Does it strike anyone else as sadly funny that the country which has meddled in other countries for so long, has finally had a foreign puppet + stooge installed in itself?
There's no Russian money, and no new Saudi money there.
What does "free antenna" mean here?
Obligation to have a starlink terminal on the plane to enable communication with the radio tower. This comes with the added bonus of enabling Elon to sell Starlink internet in-flight.
Prescribed users will get access to net and non-users will get forked as per-usual. But with an Elon branded fork instead.
I also expect he's eager to make it proprietary. That way it would then force all other airlines that route through the USA to have a Starlink terminals too.
I use a mini in-flight. I welcome anything to bring the price down (currently $250/mo for 50 GB)
However, this "fix" not being put out for bid is ridiculous. That's not how competition and the market works. This feels like African-style "whatchu gonna do about it" big man corruption.
The story is misleading and the commenter adds extra nonsense.
Not to mention Starlink is further cemented as critical infrastructure and less liable to be sanctioned by future administrations.
Starlink is also one low earth orbit detonation from ceasing to exist.
Is the only hope to resolve this Verizon fighting this out in court?
Yeah, which they won't. They'll settle for half the price and walk away from.
Just another asset they don't have to manage. It's not like they're short of money.
Yeah, unfortunately the list of federal judges skews heavily towards team Trump.
I'm gonna say this every time this comes up: These people should be in PRISON. They are criminals. If we care about law and order, we must remove them immediately from office. End of story. I am sick and tired of apologists for these people, if you believe they are conducting themselves legally, you do not believe in our Republic, you are complicit, you are a traitor to our country and to the American project. We will find you with our pitchforks, it is only a matter of time.
Unfortunately the article (and you additionally) are being misleading about the details.
The antenna on every plane is provided by Iridium/Inmarsat and is a totally different thing from this.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43206833
Here's this FAA video about the matter. Keyword relevant to Starlink is RTIR https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/an...
Oh, wow, the SpaceX team inside the FAA actually pushed to have the contract, already awarded to Verizon, canceled and given instead to Starlink.
No attempt whatever there to avoid the obvious conflict of interest.
Going forward I think we can assume that conflict of interest doesn't exist anymore. No DEI but they'll replace it with nepotism and full on corruption.
Conflict of interest isn’t a strong enough description. This is corruption.
The genius move by Trump is doing full on corruption out in the open leaves people confused. Full corruption, foreign brides/influence, blatant political favors are the norm now. I remember when the MAGAs complained about Hilary's emails and Hunter on the board of some company. Now we have a full on corruption out in the open and no one gives a shit.
This is the true secret of American government, though. We do everything that every other corrupt government does, except we've managed to legalize it.
You used to hide it better too.
I mean they’re just copying this model off the Russians.
Do Verizon shareholders have a lawsuit here against Starlink?
Luckily Elon said he would step away if he thought there would be conflicts of interests - nothing to see here.
The new administration just cut 400 jobs at the FAA [1], and now Musk will directly pocket the "savings" to "work" on some bullshit useless tech. When Musk talks "waste and bloat", he means public money that doesn't end up in his pocket.
As a result, air traffic is noticeably more dangerous, and many lost their livelihoods in these increasingly uncertain times, just to make the wealthiest man on Earth a bit more wealthy. The "Fell for it Again Award" goes to...
[1] https://apnews.com/article/faa-firings-trump-doge-safety-air...
It's actually legal for FAA to fire it's employees.
No one said it wasn't. It was not legal the way it was done.
When I commented the post said "illegally". Glad I could help :)
What was illegal about how it was done?
This quote from your link:
> FAA Administrator Sean Duffy said over the weekend that no air traffic controllers or critical safety personnel were cut.
There's more to air safety than air traffic controllers...
Oh, there was an RFP to award the contract? No? Then it's corruption.
Even with the proper contract awarding process, corruption is widespread.
Decisions made at lunches and then the contract award process skewed to award the correct person, at some insane markup over real market prices for the same service.
The process is unfixable. Instead we should just look at a teams total cost and total achievement every year, and if the money they've spent doesn't look good value for money, we give them a bad performance review and their government career will be tricky to repair.
That is a far stronger incentive to get the most out of taxpayer money than ever stricter, yet super easy to game, anti corruption measures.
Unfortunately this doesn’t work either. Contracting is risk adverse and tries to avoid legal battles at all costs so even bad reviews often get scrubbed and edited until they look glowing.
The risk adverse nature of the govt needs to be fixed before the incentives align.
Do any governments employ a competitive approach to awarding contracts that isn't winner-take-all? If there were a way to build an ATC system utilizing both Verizon and Starlink we might get the benefits of price competition and redundancy.
Yes. The US does this with some larger programs ("systems of systems") if the components are sufficiently distinct. An aircraft? Not so much. A comms system? Absolutely, if it's not sold as one complete system. For instance, radios might be contracted to multiple vendors with the intent to drive down cost.
It's not universally done, though. It depends on how the program office(s) involved decide to run things.
EDIT: To expand. Look at space systems. The ground stations are not tied to specific space systems (though some space systems develop their own ground networks), that is a separate program from the satellites and SOCs. There is no one "space program". And even for a particular satellite system the SOC may be under a separate contract vehicle than the satellite itself.
Isn't the logical way to do that for a contractor to make a bid intending to use multiple subcontractors to provide a better service than any one contractor could provide alone?
That is one way it's done, yes.
>An aircraft? Not so much.
NASA did this with the commercial crew program, awarding to both SpaceX and Boeing to reduce risk.
Right, that's similar to the radio example I gave (multiple vendors so that there was no single point of failure, it mitigated risk and, in theory, reduces cost by introducing competition). What I meant by aircraft though was that for a specific aircraft, it'll be run by a specific contractor for all or nearly all its subcomponents. Though there could be exceptions. See the way that heavies (cargo, AWACS, and the like) are given multiple missions and some of the mission specific components may be separate programs rather than executed by the prime for the aircraft. But you won't have the government contract for the engine and the airframe separately.
Though you also have that done for aircraft. The F-35 was selected among several aircraft that were being developed by various contractors as the one to move forward as the JSF. This is where the lifecycle of a program comes into play. In the R&D stages you'll see multiple options quite commonly because they want to compete different vendors. Eventually it whittles down to one for things like aircraft to move forward. Though, using the JSF as an example, maybe they should select multiple. LM were the geniuses that thought you could increase software productivity by hiring more programmers and having them work in shifts.
even conceding that, letting one guy decide it using executive power is problematic. And illegal
This doesn't matter. By definition, the premise "I will step aside if there's a conflict" is itself a conflict of interest.
Even with an RFP it can be corruption. The RFP can be written so that only a single specific vendor can deliver cost effectively.
Probably.
Given the systemic corruption elsewhere, I can’t summon anger about this until I can verify if the utility is necessary and uniquely provided by Starlink. If so, then this is just bad optics. If not, it should be aggressively fought.
If it were “uniquely provided” by Starlink, how do you think Verizon got the award?
Were they unable to fulfill the contract?
As I said, I don’t have the full context here.
It’s a 15 year contract awarded in 2023 so it may be too early to tell. The strongest public claims that Verizon isn’t capable comes from their competitor so those claims should probably be taken with a boulder of salt until more information is made available.
This has nothing to do with Verizon.
All these arguments (and this article) come from a place of ignorance)
Care to elaborate? I think the more salient issue is the contracting process, not any particular company.
Is the "Moving fast and breaking things" attitude commonly associated with these types of companies compatible with ATC?
While I acknowledge their success in space, a LOT of guardrails/regulation were placed upon them to assure safe progress. Now they're both running the regulatory agency while also providing the end-product, which may mean faster progress but less safety overall.
Air travel is, generally, safe. The US has an issue with low staffing levels in ATC, and while automated systems have helped, the workload is still too high. It will likely be years before a Starlink product would come online, so staffing levels need to be addressed in the near-term.
>While I acknowledge their success in space
Not to mention the early model was built on govt contracts because the govt was the only institution capable of shouldering the risk of an unproven space vendor.
Not saying that’s a bad thing, just that the success of SpaceX and the govt were tightly coupled.
Interestingly, it looks like the “BEAD program” - a rural broadband initiative was allocated more funding ($42b) than SpaceX and Tesla combined ($37b). That last number includes loans, too.
I chose that example in particular because Starlink has done more for rural broadband access than everything else the federal government has done combined.
I agree Starlink is poised to be very successful at providing high speed internet to rural areas. But that doesn’t negate the point that it required the govt to do so because SpaceX would not exist if it didn’t get high risk govt contracts. Also, I wouldn’t compare it to terrestrial internet unless you advocate it being a regulated utility in the same way, which I doubt Musk or investors would want. Different rules, different constraints.
True - but the BEAD Program delivered internet to 40k households. Starlink has 1.4m users in the US alone.
It seems pretty clear to me that Starlink has been a good investment, from both private and public perspectives
That's RDOF. BEAD is zero
Elon is exactly the person to want to rewrite things from scratch and break shit. Hopefully, a drop in air travel due to safety fears leads to the workload decreasing, thereby allowing these forced system upgrades to happen with less harm.
Best source I've found for exactly what this is was reddit, here: https://www.reddit.com/r/ATC/comments/1izjg2m/starlinkverizo... for a system called FENS here: https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/cinp/fens
And here's a video https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/an... Starlink is relevant to RTIR.
While I don’t like the way it is handled, I’m going to be a contrarian here and say this could be a good thing. Previously, the contract was awarded to Verizon at the same price. I have more faith in SpaceX’s ability to deliver than Verizon and if starlink antennas are on every plane, aircraft internet will likely be better overall as a side effect.
Please convince me why this view is incorrect, I am open to listen.
You're making those assertions with no absolutely no data though. In a sane, non-corrupt system a trusted third party with recognised industry experience would assess the contract, what has been agreed to and what been delivered and make an evaluation based on the cost, risk, timetables etc. None of that happened here. It's just naked corruption.
What you are talking about is a pure theory and never exist in real world. Start with trusted 3rd party - trusted by who?
Starlink technologically can provide better connectivity in terms of speed and reliability compared to Verizon (can doesn’t mean it will of course). So there is some credibility to the decision.
But of course populace prefer to focus on flamboyant personalities instead of “based on cost, risk, timetables” ain’t it?
Procurement rules exist for a reason, letting one guy funnel business to his company using the President's power is a huge risk to the nation-state.
Imagine if he decides to disconnect all in-flight airliners just because he’s high?
The existing system is already corrupt so I don’t think that hypothetical is helpful here. The process by which contracts are awarded is already unfair and biased towards certain players with the right connections to get a contract written in a way that only they can fulfill.
It’s possible, although I have not verified, that the contract was written in such a way that Verizon was the only qualified applicant because of lobbying.
The concern is specifically the way it is handled, though?
So, could bad things still lead to good things? Of course. Do we generally accept "ends justifies the means"? I didn't think so?
As for downsides, I confess the five year life cycle of the satellites is of some concern to me. Seems more so of a problem the more of them you have to put up there?
Arbitrary power can achieve a lot of good things but it always ends the same way. So better WiFi on the plane but one day you find you can't get on a plane anymore because you said the wrong thing.
Isn't that already how it works? At least for specific values of "the wrong thing" - one day you find you can't get on a plane because you said "I want to blow up this plane."
But also "I am going to Colombia to bring some cocaine home." and "I am going to Washington to assassinate the president." and "The right of the people to keep and bear nuclear bombs shall not be infringed." and any number of other things that don't immediately threaten the plane's integrity.
That's a pretty weak ass argument friend.
From now on, if you say Trump is fat or ugly you will be permanently banned from ever flying again.
Trump probably wouldn't care, but if you tweet that at Elon...
Bans from planes are already arbitrary and capricious, so I don’t think changing which arbitrary power is responsible really makes a difference here. Look at all the news articles of people ending up on the no fly list for garbage grounds.
What you said could be true, but it's overshadowed by the fact that this is blatant corruption.
This is not about communications on aircraft itself and will have no impact on aircraft internet.
However I'd rather have the backhaul between air traffic control centers done by fiber rather than by Starlink...
Not to mention the naked corruption
What’s the tradeoff between reliability/cost/performance between different infrastructure approaches? I’d assume for safety critical applications, reliability is the priority.
Can't give real answers without data on Starlink reliability (or non-consumer features), but personally as someone who depended on ATC both as small time pilot and more regularly as passenger, I'd be wary of sat radio as main backhaul.
Of course Verizon can fsck it up as well, but multiple leased fiber lines, possibly direct MPLS with guarantees on latency and bandwidth, or maybe even DWDM between major locations sounds more reliable to my instincts.
Most importantly I don't trust the hatchet job way this is done, not just on Starlink use, but the whole hatchet job with FAA.
With density of flights in USA, intra-ATC Comms are non trivial part of safety - passing flight information on structured messages rather than by hand between areas is... More than important.
Do you happen to have watched this video?
https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/an...
I haven't before, but due to certain private interests I can explain what they mean by "legacy copper TDM infrastructure".
A lot of interconnections between US ATC services were done back with the good old Bell System over then new T1/T3 digital carriers, plus analog leased lines in some cases, that provided high reliability and high quality of service links for both data and voice (which could include voice connection to remote radio transceivers).
This is, of course, being phased out even from "compatibility mode" setups where you get old style trunks that are backed by newer infrastructure. So the network infrastructure is literally dying out.
A comparable setup with modern tech would be MPLS fiber backbone with capacity reservation (thus actually getting stable latency and bandwidth guarantees), which would allow creation of virtual meshes with different QoS requirements that would provide both stable voice service (including from centralized ATC to remote radar transceivers), guaranteed performance data links (for example for radars etc), slower but still guaranteed service bulk data transfers, etc.
I might have also mentioned DWDM, which essentially lets you create a physical fiber optic path where switching is done by optical elements based on frequency of the signal (so you can pack multiple signals into one fiber then route them to different ports etc. etc.) - very useful if you want no variability in connection while still be able to reroute them fast.
That exactly is the point of the program. A shift to an IP network.
Where Starlink comes in is in the intermediate step. Before Verizon finishes running their MPLS network, there's a program called RTRI that provides an off ramp for TDM, so when Lumen stops serving, they have something. It's contracted to L3Harris and runs over SDWAN while using any network as an overlay. Satellite (including GEO), Cable and 5G (anything available really)
Sidestepping the corruption piece, which is a huge problem here to be clear, my understanding is that SpaceX has promised to provide starlink antennas at no cost to be used in commercial aircraft. Assuming that is true (again, a big if), then wouldn’t a natural consequence here be Starlink back Internet on the planes?
That said, I may have been reading misinformation and it’s only provided to ATC towers.
They wouldn't be used for ATC though. Internet access from aircraft is, outside of questions whether it interferes with aircraft operations, outside of FAA purview (at most, it's FCC and ITU-T depending scope)
This isn't going on aircraft. It's for ATC related stuff and it's not, contrary to the article, replacing Verizon
> I have more faith in SpaceX’s ability to deliver than Verizon
Why? Verizon has been delivering top of the line cellular service for multiple decades now. Starlink is quite new on the scene and given that they’ve now captured management of the agency they’re selling to, they have no incentive to actually provide high quality service. They could do a shitty job and keep the contract, so why would they bother to do well?
> They could do a shitty job and keep the contract, so why would they bother to do well?
I think this is probably the key piece I didn’t consider. SpaceX’s previous work was done under heavy competitive pressure so they had to do good. Here it doesn’t matter what they do.
With Verizon, my doubts came from all of the reporting that’s happened on rural broadband funding. A lot of the companies, including Verizon, essentially took the money and ran without doing all of the work (from my understanding).
> While I don’t like the way it is handled
In concerns such as this, the process matters. If we don't follow it this time, then why follow next time or the time after? Then, if this rule or that law doesn't matter, then do any of them matter?
I think people would have been more comfortable if they decided to send it out to bid again - not great since it was already awarded, but at least going back through the public process.
Why would it be better? If you can cancel your competitors contracts and award them to yourself, the only incentive you have is to just...raise the price.
Yep obviously Verizon is a bloated company with zero innovation and no particular experience relevant to the FAA. Meanwhile SpaceX has experience in software, hardware, telecom, and flight. I trust them more with modernizing the FAA.
There’s also very little information on who else bid for this contract that Verizon got. How do we know it wasn’t corrupt to begin with, especially with Biden engaging in lawfare against Musk and doing bizarre things like excluding him from EV summits? The entire FAA modernization plan looks corrupt - everyone else that got contracts are random unknown companies. I bet they have ties back to some congressman.
> How do we know it wasn’t corrupt to begin with
If we think that, isn't the solution to reopen the bidding with more transparency, rather than hand it to the guy who just so happens to both be in charge of the team pushing for this and owns the company the new contract is awarded to?
Your replacing "maybe this was corrupt", with 'this is blatantly and obviously corrupt"
It’s not blatantly or obviously corrupt. It is very likely to be better for taxpayers.
I can't think of anything much more corrupt than someone in government directing a government contract to a vendor they own with no process for considering other vendors. If that seems fine to you, then I don't think we'll ever agree on what corruption looks like.
If Starlink is actually "very likely to be better for taxpayers" it should have no problem going through the normal bidding process competing with other vendors.
Good God, it's a textbook example of corruption!
maybe, maybe not, but are you saying the ends justify the quite likely corrupt means?
It's illegal and unfair competition. We can't just throw out laws we hate all the time on the whims on an unelected guy in the White House.
SpaceX is clearly better technology, but I believe what matters is whether Verizon was fairly awarded the contract.
If the contract was made fairly and in good faith, cancelling it would be bad for contract law precedence in the new administration.
I take contract law over advancement in technology in this case.
It’s adorable we still think this administration still cares about respecting the law.
Even giving the benefit of the doubt that they would do a good job: The ends do not justify the means. That's really all it is. Pragmatically speaking, Americans simply abhor an unelected hundred-billionaire who behaves in a mean, trollish, and "hateable" manner, forcing himself into the institutions of their home country in a way that appears destructive and careless. For each individual case, whether it actually ends up improved by some metric (and whether Elon is even actively involved) is overshadowed ten-fold by the societal damage caused, the dangerous precedent created, and the fighting spirit of Americans against authoritarianism.
Leaving aside the corruption thing there could be a lot to be said for satellite coms for aircraft and air traffic control as air traffic is global and the only way to have a system that will work anywhere including over oceans is satellite really.
So, standards and multiple independent implementations operated by multiple service providers.
As someone who dabbled as a user of satelite internet before spacex, nobody else can do it. It sucked
SpaceX changed the rules of the game - before SpaceX we all used stationary satellites, needed to point antennas to them, deal with atrocious latencies and low bandwidths.
The enabling technology is constellations in low orbit and SpaceX isn't the only one anymore.
Put aside the Musk hatred. Maybe the company that has 8k satellites in orbit and can bring internet to anywhere in the world, is a better fit than a cell phone company?
Can a rogue nation across the globe launch one small rocket to disrupt critical infrastructure based on cell towers?
Collect everything. Talks, notes, contacts, emails, copies of contracts, whatever data is possible.
Once a proper government is in place, prosecute them all.
the airplane market is juicy, but "just wait" for the US Postal Service privatizations.. that will be real money
Banana republic shit.
Not much more to say, really. There's blatant conflict of interest going on, but I guess we're way past that. Four next years is going to be a non-stop firehose of grift, good thing they won't even bother to hide it.
Dont worry, the Corpo Wolves will battle out in court. Us lambs have nothing to worry about.
It kind of doesn't matter if this is the best choice or not. If Elon wants to occupy the position he does in the government, he needs to remove his companies from the pool of government contracts.
I like DOGE's stated objectives. I like SpaceX, and Starlink. They probably ARE a better choice than Verizon. It doesn't matter.
That being said, do I think that bankers and defense contractors and tech companies and oil execs etc have not bought their way into similarish positions of influence for the last many decades? Probably. But Elon's power at the moment feels far less bounded and far more arbitrary.
Verizon has a valid solid network when you're outside of the consumer network. In the business world, Verizon is actually pretty decent and very established. Verizon business is very different to Verizon consumer.
It does matter, imo. You don't want planes to lose communication with base. Satellite has its faults and his ISP has only been around for five years.
The HN headline is really misleading.
The text has a better description: "a SpaceX-led team within the FAA is reportedly recommending it go to Starlink"
"Musk orders FAA to give him $2.4 billion" would be more accurate.
Another Verge [dupe]:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43201750
I'm genuinely curious on what defense of this move folks can offer? Seems like one of the more blatantly corrupt moves I've seen in a long time.
https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/an... it's a misleading article and it falls under RTIR
[flagged]
Here are the facts regarding the situation with Starlink, the FAA, and the Verizon contract as of February 28, 2025: The FAA awarded Verizon a $2.4 billion contract in 2023 to upgrade its air traffic control communication system, known as the FAA Enterprise Network Services (FENS) program.
As of February 27, 2025, reports indicate the FAA is considering canceling this contract and potentially shifting the work to Starlink, a SpaceX subsidiary owned by Elon Musk.
The FAA has not finalized this decision, stating "no decisions have been made" about the Verizon contract.
Currently, the FAA is testing three Starlink terminals: one in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and two at non-safety-critical sites in Alaska.
Elon Musk has claimed the existing Verizon system (though later corrected to an L3Harris system) is failing rapidly, posing risks to air travelers, and that Starlink is providing terminals "at no cost to the taxpayer on an emergency basis." The FAA has not publicly confirmed this risk assessment.
SpaceX employees are working within FAA facilities, assisting with technology upgrades, amid a broader Trump administration effort to modernize the agency.
The process to unwind a federal contract and reassign it typically requires a competitive bidding process or justification under specific legal exceptions (e.g., national security or urgent public interest), which has not been publicly detailed in this case.
These aren't the facts sorry. The program is still going to Verizon, but there's a transition from TDM to IP called RTRI. That's where Starlink comes in. It's run by L3Harris, not SpaceX.
https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/an...
Musk is self-awarding contracts? The government has fallen.
lol, you guys in the US are so screwed
why did you vote for these corrupt clowns?
it seems like US govt always either 180s from the previous president, or morphs into it's last enemy, in one way or another.
Osama, Obama
Russian Oligarchy, American Oligarchy
I almost expect a Putinesque invasion of a 'threatening' nation, maybe Cuba, or somewhere around the south-east-asian sea (the so-called south-china sea), or maybe rotten Denmark if they won't give up Greenland.
And the country that you reside in has never had clowns of corruption? I doubt it.
Scant few Western nations in recent times have had this level of clown show.
Not on this scale. The US will be worse than Venezuela soon.
Woo! Blatant self-dealing. Hardcore!
Banana republic kleptocracy will not help America.
I see a lot of pessimism here which makes me think Elon Musk is right when he says they are just having some fun and people lack a sense of humor. Cheer up, people! Geez. /s
I don't live in the US so I don't care. Do you?
Yes. Is your country's culture and economy 100% shielded from what happens in the US?
In the mid 90s, I recall talking to some of the people working on the current scheme to modernize ATC. This was the 3rd or 4th attempt, and billions had already been spent.
Since then, there have been many efforts and many more billions spent. I'm sure all of these efforts went through the proper channels, etc, but all that has shown is that (a) FAA has no clue how to manage these contracts, and (b) the normal way of doing this absolutely doesn't work.
In contrast, this is how civil infrastructure used to get done in the US:
https://www.inventionandtech.com/content/antique-machines-yo...
Elon seems to be the only person really performing at this level anymore in this space.
0.8 billion people fly in the US per year.
Paying $3 per passenger for air traffic control seems insane.
The whole scheme should be costing more like 0.1 cents per passenger.
Start from that price, and then figure out what service you can offer with that money.
$800k should pay for a flight planning/replanning website made by one dev in a few months, and half an on-call rotation to man a helpline.
>Start from that price, and then figure out what service you can offer with that money.
I say this not to attack you personally, but because I can't think of any other way to describe this idea (and I do realize that this does not contribute to a high quality discussion)...
Approaching something as vital and complicated as air traffic safety by saying, "I will only take the services I can get for some completely arbitrary amount of money," is utterly fucking stupid.
I didn’t find this rude. I would prefer to not die on an airplane.
I'm glad clowns like you aren't in government. Oh wait...
Dude, $800k won't even pay for a new piston single. That's like three ATC salaries.
I don't know where you get the idea that this is enough money. It's not, it's absurdly low, and "half an on-call" to stop airplanes from crashing when your Node.js app crashes sounds more like a joke than a serious proposal.
I'll be the last do defend this project but it's not like they'll spend 2.8b every single year
> $800k should pay for a flight planning/replanning website made by one dev in a few months, and half an on-call rotation to man a helpline.
I realize I'm piling on, but do you really believe that ATC comms just tracks flight plans? Or are you just trolling?
I would call this a zero content effort but it seems more like a negative effort intended to spark more ire and anger. Very poor contribution.
You shouldn't forget to add the /s to your comment, people might mistake you for a fucking idiot.