The very brief summary I got (and I'm not in the park) was John realized he was way behind schedule and exited Piute Creek to Piute Pass (instead of over Muir to Bishop Pass as originally planned). On the way he met a packer who recognized him and went out with him (less sure about that).
All of you familiar with the terrain know what an ambitious plan he had.
This sort of SAR is becoming much more common -- people choosing long gnarly routes beyond their ability to keep that kind of pace or negotiate the terrain. Many seem to happen in the fall with shorter hiking days as well as bad weather keeping people storm-bound. Not sure of total story with Williams, but all of the above is suggested by outcome and his abilities.
To John's credit, he had a date he planned to be out and a "come look for me" date where he thought he'd likely be in trouble if not out by then. He also had a specific itinerary left with a responsible party.
Incidentally, on a not very related side-note: we're now getting a number of 'attempts to locate' from relatives or spouses of people hiking with SPOTs. If they don't send their daily "OK" signal, the relative calls the park and asks us to look for the person. As has been posted here, The SPOT has a very high signal failure rate and doesn't tell you for sure if a signal has been successfully sent (not 100% sure of last....). Probably have a policy on this next year -- e.g. if agency has no reason to suspect someone's injured, we don't look for them merely at the request of spouse etc.
g.
