Explainers
Crown Mountain hiker rescued after AI route led to cliff
A 16-year-old trusted an AI-planned route. Rescuers needed three hours to reach him near the Widowmaker.
Popular Science reports that a 16-year-old hiker in British Columbia used an AI-generated route to climb Crown Mountain and ended up stuck on a steep cliff near a climbing route called the Widowmaker.
Rescue teams spent roughly three hours working out how to reach him. A helicopter could not get close enough because the teen was near the Widowmaker's final headwall, so a ground crew used a rope belay system to reach him, gave him extra protective gear and moved him to a better spot for extraction. The responders had finished a rescue certification training session earlier that day not far away.
Search manager Paul Markey told North Shore News: "The boy was very scared. He definitely feared for his life." He also said the route was beyond the teen's abilities.
Markey's comment echoes a wider problem: AI tools still make things up. Popular Science points out that generative AI has suggested adding glue to pizza sauce, claimed snakes are mammals and recommended "blinker fluid" for a broken turn signal.
The Crown Mountain rescue was not the first AI hiking mishap. About a month earlier, according to Popular Science, three people got stranded near Mount Shasta in California after using Google Gemini to plan their trip. Gemini suggested they carry less food and water than they needed, turning a normally eight-hour outing into a multiday emergency.
Markey and other rescue officials suggest using well-tested route apps like AllTrails, CalTopo and Gaia GPS. An AI chatbot's confident answer is not a trail map. Check the route against a reliable source before you head out, and know when to turn around.
Related stories
Explainers
Kyoto researcher: olive oil first cut glucose rise in mice
In mice, olive oil given 15 minutes before glucose led to a smaller early blood sugar rise than the same oil given afterward, ScienceDaily reports.
Explainers
POLO pathway: a hidden drain at the back of the eye
A Canadian team reports a lymphatic drainage route behind the retina, traced so far in mice, that may clear waste from the eye.
Explainers
Tutankhamun's tomb: the Nefertiti theory, testable at last
Scientific American reports that radar and gravity surveys hint at concealed spaces beyond Tutankhamun's burial chamber, but the evidence stops well short of a discovery.