AI app helps blind man complete solo 5-km run
new york — A blind man completed a 5-kilometre run in New York’s Central Park without a guide dog or human help this week. His navigation aid? Artificial intelligence through headphones plugged into a smartphone.
“The safest thing for a blind man is to sit still. I ain’t sitting still,” said Thomas Panek, 50, who lost his vision in his early 20s due to a genetic condition and runs Guiding Eyes for the Blind, a guide dog school.
The marathon enthusiast got tired of having to follow slower runners as a guide. So he decided a year ago to find a way to run solo. He turned to Google to find a way for a phone to “tell me where to go,” said Panek, who believes “humans are born to run.”
He worked with the Alphabet Inc unit to create a research programme. A smartphone camera picks up a painted ‘guideline’ on a running track. An app detects the runner’s position and gives audio guidance through an earpiece.
“It’s like teaching a kid how to learn where the line is,” said Google researcher Xuan Yang.
“To be able to be here, it’s real emotional,” Panek said after his test of the app on a chilly fall afternoon, in an event sponsored by Google and the New York Road Runners. “It’s a real feeling of not only freedom and independence, but also, you know, you get that sense that you’re just like anybody else.” —
It’s a real feeling of not only freedom, but also, you know, you get sense that you’re just like anybody else.” Thomas Panek