British Columbia and a tiny fishing village is now atwitter after the world’s wealthiest man made an unannounced appearance over the weekend.
Elon Musk, the controversial and now apparently political CEO of Tesla and X, touched down in Bella Bella—an isolated town nestled in the Great Bear Rainforest—before departing again by helicopter.
His visit to the town with approximately 1,500 residents was a surprise.
Local resident Seán Carter told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that the area is no stranger to high-profile visitors.
He added that Musk was possibly passing through en route to James Murdoch, son of media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who is a board member at Tesla, where Musk serves as CEO, and who owns a property off the coast.
“It’s not every day the richest man in the world comes through town,” he said. “That’s going to be a tough one to top.”
CBC News confirmed that Musk’s private jet touched down in Vancouver late Friday night and departed Monday afternoon. Visual evidence viewed by the CBC reportedly aligns with flight data tracked online and show Musk arriving and departing.
Wait, Elon Musk is Canadian?
If you follow the lore of Musk, he was born in South Africa and is a Canadian citizen through his mother, Maye Musk, who was born in Regina, according to official biographies. Musk moved to Saskatchewan and then Vancouver as a teen, and attended college in Canada.
In recent months, Musk’s visits and Canadian ties have fueled debate. Earlier this year, a petition circulated calling for the government to revoke his citizenship over his role in President Trump’s White House, exactly as Musk was getting heavy handed in tariff talks between the two countries.
In Ontario and Western Canada, Musk’s tempestuous influence has also complicated political relationships.
Quebec, B.C., and other provinces have debated decisions to exclude Tesla from EV rebate programs in response to U.S. tariffs, with B.C. Premier David Eby citing “retaliation” as the reason. In a move that showed at least one of Musk’s businesses still matters to Canadian communities, more than half of Canadian rural areas are buying services from Musk’s Starlink satellite internet to improve connectivity.
Musk has gone back and forth on his own complicated feelings about Canada.
In 2023, he posted a photo wearing a “I Love Canada” T-shirt and declared himself “half-Canadian.” But in February 2025, in response to the citizenship revocation petition, he tweeted, “Canada is not a real country” before deleting the message.
Carter told the CBC that, politics aside, Musk’s passage through Bella Bella was one for the history books. “No matter what your opinion of him is, it’s something to follow,” he said.
Locals have mixed feelings about Musk
The town’s residents clearly had mixed feelings about Musk’s drop-in.
Emily Lowan, a candidate for the B.C. Green Party leadership, posted images of Musk’s arrival on social media, writing, “yet another reason to tax billionaires out of existence.”
But in typical Canadian fashion, Carter said that Musk did not get any special treatment at the local airport and then had to walk for a bit.
“It was quite busy,” Carter said. “The plane landed on one side, the helicopter on the other, and he had to walk a long way. He probably hoped to come in and out quietly, but there are no secrets in this town.”