US hiker fined for cost of rescue

A teenager who spent three nights alone on a US mountain in April after he sprained an ankle and veered off marked trails has been fined more than $25,000 (€18,000) for the cost of his rescue.

Scott Mason had been praised for utilising his Eagle Scout skills – sleeping in the crevice of a boulder and jump-starting fires with hand sanitiser gel.

But authorities say he wasn’t prepared for the conditions he encountered and shouldn’t have set out on such an ambitious hike.

“Yes, he’d been out there in July when you could step across the brooks. And people have been out there in winter in hard-packed snow. But with these spring conditions, it was soft snow, it was deep snow,” said Fish and Game Major Tim Acerno.

Mr Acerno said he believes Scott’s fine is the largest ever sought under a nine-year-old New Hampshire law that allows lost hikers and climbers to be charged for rescue costs.

Scott’s rescue was particularly expensive because the helicopters the state typically used were unavailable, and a helicopter from Maine had to be brought in, Mr Acerno said.

Scott, 17, of Halifax, Massachusetts, had planned to spend one day hiking 17 miles in the New Hampshire mountains but ended up lost on Mount Washington after he hurt his ankle and decided to take a shortcut.