IT Home On October 10, the New York Times published a blog post on October 8, reporting that a 16-year-old hiker from Canada accidentally entered the “Widowmaker Arete,” a climb site that requires rock climbing equipment, after using Claude to plan a route on Crown Mountain. He was later successfully rescued by a helicopter.
16-year-old Bryce Vincent Gowryluk left his home in downtown Vancouver at 7:30 a.m. on Saturday, October 3rd, local time, and was originally planned to travel from Gloucester Mountain to Crown Mountain and back, with a total distance of approximately 8 hours.
Since he had previously reached the summit of Crown Mountain, he used Anthropic’s chatbot Claude to try to plan a new hiking route. However, the hiker mistook “Widow Maker Ridge” for “Crown Couloir”. The former is located on the Crown Mountain range, with a steep and exposed slope that usually requires ropes and other climbing equipment; the latter is the route he originally intended to climb.
After Blyth climbed a distance with his bare hands, he found that the terrain became increasingly difficult and he couldn’t safely return along the original path. He was trapped on a rock formation about 5 feet wide. After contacting his mother, he called the Canadian Royal Mounted Police, and the police informed the Vancouver Volunteer Search and Rescue team on the North Shore. The rescue team then sent a helicopter to successfully free him. IT Home has attached the relevant screenshots as follows:
Goriluk said he did not blame Claude; he took responsibility for the route selection. He also mentioned that Google Maps and AllTrails were used during the planning process. The report did not specify what route information each tool provided.
Paul Markey, the head of North Shore Rescue, said Claude does not know the actual location and terrain, and AI cannot replace the experience and common sense of mountain climbers on the trails.
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