Elon Musk used a grotesque slur to attack famed astronaut Andreas Mogensen in an angry social media post.
In a Fox News interview with President Donald Trump last week, Musk suggested that Sunita 'Suni' Williams and Barry 'Butch' Wilmore had been left 'stranded' in space because of 'political reasons' by the Biden administration.
For context, the two NASA astronauts have been up on the International Space Station (ISS) since June 2024 after their spacecraft, the Boeing Starliner, experienced technical problems during what was supposed to be an eight-day mission. This meant they were unable to return to Earth on their originally scheduled date.
Williams and Wilmore are now expected to return next month on a SpaceX capsule instead.
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SpaceX CEO Musk said he was 'accelerating the return of the astronauts' after it was 'postponed to a ridiculous degree', with Trump adding: "They got left in space," - something the astronauts have denied.
Renowned astronaut Andreas Mogensen also branded Musk's claim as complete nonsense.
Sharing a clip of the interview on X, the Danish astronaut wrote: "What a lie.
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"And from someone who complains about lack of honesty from the mainstream media."
However, the post seemingly ruffled Musk's feathers as he angrily attacked the astronaut, calling him 'r******d'.
Musk replied: "You are fully r******d.
"SpaceX could have brought them back several months ago.
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"I OFFERED THIS DIRECTLY to the Biden administration and they refused.
"Return WAS pushed back for political reasons.
"Idiot."
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But the back and forth continued, as Mogensen responded for a second time.
The astronaut penned: "Elon, I have long admired you and what you have accomplished, especially at SpaceX and Tesla.
"You know as well as I do, that Butch and Suni are returning with Crew-9, as has been the plan since last September.
"Even now, you are not sending up a rescue ship to bring them home. They are returning on the Dragon capsule that has been on ISS since last September."
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And it seems as though the spat halted there.
In recent days, Musk has also received direct backlash following his brutal email to US government staff.
He sent an email to federal workers demanding them to reveal what they had done in the last week and said that failure to respond would be taken as their resignation from their role.
In his statement defending workers, Everett Kelley, the president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) union, said: "It is cruel and disrespectful to hundreds of thousands of veterans who are wearing their second uniform in the civil service to be forced to justify their job duties to this out-of-touch, privileged, unelected billionaire who has never performed one single hour of honest public service in his life."
In response to the bizarre email, Tibor Nagy of the State Department also wrote: "No employee is obligated to report their activities outside of their Department chain of command."
Tyla has contacted representatives for Elon Musk for comment.
Topics: Elon Musk, Donald Trump, Politics, Social Media
Mia Williams