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Northrop Grumman, Not SpaceX, Reported To Be at Fault For Loss of Top-Secret Zuma Satellite (cnbc.com)
Northrop Grumman built and operated the components that failed during the controversial January launch of the U.S. spy satellite known as Zuma, WSJ reported over the weekend. From a report: Two independent investigations, made up of federal and industry officials, pointed to Northrop's payload adapter as the cause of the satellite's loss, the report said, citing people familiar with the probes. The payload adapter is a key part of deploying a satellite in orbit, connecting the satellite to the upper stage of a rocket. Zuma is believed to have cost around $3.5 billion to develop, according to the report. The satellite was funded through a process that received a lesser degree of oversight from Congress compared with similar national security-related satellites, industry officials said.
I got the strong impression that dysfunction was the name of the game of these companies.
Because it is. Every major city and military base has underground tunnels, there are underground cities in the middle of nowhere, and the Hyperloop is just a system that already exists and they want to monetize - they're all connected already. None of that stuff is officially funded and constitutes the many trillions of dollars of black budget projects - contractors and spying on everyone is a red herring (though the spying likely also helps them in controlling politicians and other potential adversaries.) Musk seems to be a part of that system geared toward monetization of some of those resources out of fear that the funding might stop (e.g. taking billions in government funding to fuel Solar City, Tesla, SpaceX, while publicly "giving" the idea of hyperloop - aka monetization of the already-existing tunnel system while getting support to pay for the tunnels already in place, which will just go to other projects.)