Elon Musk and Ryanair’s chief executive Michael O'Leary have turned a commercial disagreement over aircraft installation of SpaceX’s Starlink satellite terminals into a public spat, trading personal insults across social media and interviews. O'Leary said he would not fit Starlink equipment on more than 600 Ryanair aircraft, arguing that antennas mounted on the fuselage would increase drag and weight and lift airline fuel bills; Musk accused him of being misinformed and later joined the fray on X, calling O'Leary "a fool" and even replying approvingly when a user suggested he buy the carrier and fire its boss.
The exchange crystallises a tension at the intersection of aviation and low‑earth‑orbit (LEO) satellite broadband: airlines see passenger demand for reliable inflight Wi‑Fi, while carriers are highly sensitive to any change that could raise operating costs. Starlink has been courting airlines as a lucrative growth market and has already signed agreements and tests with a number of carriers, but fitting high‑throughput user terminals to jet airframes raises questions of certification, drag, and fuel burn — all areas where airlines demand hard data rather than headline‑grabbing promises.
O'Leary put numbers behind his objection, estimating that equipping Ryanair’s fleet would increase annual operating costs by $200–250 million. Spread across a low‑cost carrier with more than 600 aircraft, that figure implies additional costs on the order of a few hundred thousand dollars per aircraft per year — material for a carrier that monetises every euro of efficiency. Engineers point out that added drag, antenna weight, and the cumulative fuel penalty across dense short‑haul networks can be meaningful, although suppliers contest the size of such penalties and argue that newer low‑drag antenna designs and aerodynamic fairings can mitigate much of the effect.
Beyond the technical and commercial dispute, the public nature of the clash matters. It shows how deals for next‑generation connectivity can become headline dramas when two high‑profile executives are involved, affecting bargaining space and public opinion. For the wider market the episode signals that broader adoption of LEO services in aviation will be a negotiated process requiring certified hardware, transparent fuel‑burn studies, inventive revenue shares, and careful public relations — not just product roll‑outs announced on social platforms.