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Hikers lost in Kosciuszko national park rescued within five hours by AI drone

The Guardian

A screengrab from video of the drone and AI assisted search and rescue at Dead Horse Gap in Kosciuszko national park. A screengrab from video of the drone and AI assisted search and rescue at Dead Horse Gap in Kosciuszko national park. Two hikers who veered off a walking track in Kosciuszko national park have been found within five hours using a drone powered by artificial intelligence, a first-of-its-kind mission, Fire and Rescue NSW (FRNSW) has said. The two men, aged in their 20s, were reported missing at 7pm on Tuesday evening after they failed to return to a rendezvous point on time. FRNSW's remote air piloted system was put into the air, and was able to use thermal imaging to find the hikers who had been walking the Dead Horse Gap track, about 35km south-west of Jindabyne.


Last-minute holiday gift guide: 29 editor-approved gadgets for everyone on your list

Popular Science

Is someone on your list hard to shop for? We've got a ton of great options for just about anyone. And grab a little something for yourself. We may earn revenue from the products available on this page and participate in affiliate programs. Some people get their holiday shopping done on a responsible schedule. They budget, strategize, and stay organized for a stress-free season. Last-minute holiday shopping is a time-honored tradition, and we're here to help make it a lot easier.


AI drone finds missing hiker's remains in mountains after 10 months

FOX News

Fox News Flash top headlines are here. Check out what's clicking on Foxnews.com. A missing hiker's dead body was finally found in July in Italy's rugged Piedmont region after 10 months. The recovery team credited the breakthrough to an AI-powered drone that spotted a critical clue within hours. The same process would have taken weeks or even months if done by the human eye.


A Hiker Was Missing for Nearly a Year--Until an AI System Recognized His Helmet

WIRED

How long does it take to identify the helmet of a hiker lost in a 183-hectare mountain area, analyzing 2,600 frames taken by a drone from approximately 50 meters away? If done with a human eye, weeks or months. If analyzed by an artificial intelligence system, one afternoon. The National Alpine and Speleological Rescue Corps, known by it's Italian initialism CNSAS, relied on AI to find the body of a person missing in Italy's Piedmont region on the north face of Monviso--the highest peak in the Cottian Alps--since September 2024. According to Saverio Isola, the CNSAS drone pilot who intervened along with his colleague Giorgio Viana, the operation--including searching for any sign of the missing hiker, the discovery and recovery of his body, and a stoppage due to bad weather--lasted less than three days.


This Joshua Tree search and rescue team tries to head off calamity before it strikes

Los Angeles Times

It's 4 p.m. in Joshua Tree National Park and the air temperature is hovering around 99 degrees -- relatively mild for an August afternoon. But at ground level, the sand along the popular Hidden Valley Nature Trail has reached a scorching 136. "I don't want my bare feet on that," says ranger Anna Marini as she shows her thermometer gun reading to a couple visiting from Switzerland, who are appropriately awed. Marini uses the tool as a prop to engage hikers traversing this surreal desert wilderness that's roughly the size of Rhode Island. As the coordinator of the park's Preventative Search and Rescue Program, her mission is to protect visitors from hazards that include extreme heat, razor-sharp cacti and thirsty bees.


AI-directed drones could help find lost hikers faster

MIT Technology Review

Ewers grew up skiing and hiking in the Highlands, giving him a clear idea of the complicated challenges involved in rescue operations there. "There wasn't much to do growing up, other than spending time outdoors or sitting in front of my computer," he says. "I ended up doing a lot of both." To start, Ewers took datasets of search and rescue cases from around the world, which include details such as an individual's age, whether they were hunting, horseback riding or hiking, and if they suffered from dementia, along with information about the location the person was eventually found--by water, buildings, open ground, trees, or roads. He trained an AI model with this data, in addition to geographical data from Scotland.


Guerrero: This California millionaire is peddling eternal life. Why do so many people believe him?

Los Angeles Times

For a moment, I fell under the spell of Bryan Johnson. Bathed in early-morning sunlight, the 46-year-old L.A.-based tech centimillionaire and longevity celebrity didn't look much younger than his age, although he claims to have the wrinkles of a 10-year-old and organs that are several years younger than his lifespan. We were standing at the Temescal Canyon trailhead in Pacific Palisades on Jan. 13, ahead of a Johnson-sponsored "Don't Die" hike, one of many organized across the world that day and the only one hosted by him. Of the 500-plus people who had RSVP'd for the L.A. event, about 200 showed up. Some had slept in their cars to make it.




How I Started to See Trees as Smart

The New Yorker

A couple of decades ago, on a backpacking trip in the Sierra Nevada, I was marching up a mountain solo under the influence of LSD. Halfway to the top, I took a break near a scrubby tree pushing up through the rocky soil. Gulping water and catching my breath, I admired both its beauty and its resilience. Its twisty, weathered branches had endured by wresting moisture and nutrients from seemingly unwelcoming terrain, solving a puzzle beyond my reckoning. I sensed a kind of wisdom in its conservation of resources.