diff --git a/app/templates/crumbforest/role_chat.html b/app/templates/crumbforest/role_chat.html
index 7454b5a..e54401d 100644
--- a/app/templates/crumbforest/role_chat.html
+++ b/app/templates/crumbforest/role_chat.html
@@ -97,16 +97,27 @@
                 body: formData
             });
 
-            const data = await response.json();
-
-            // Remove loading
-            const loadingEl = document.getElementById(loadingId);
-            if (loadingEl) loadingEl.remove();
-
             if (response.ok) {
+                const data = await response.json();
+                // Remove loading
+                const loadingEl = document.getElementById(loadingId);
+                if (loadingEl) loadingEl.remove();
+                
                 addMessage('assistant', data.answer);
             } else {
-                addMessage('error', data.answer || 'Error communicating with server.');
+                // Try to parse error JSON, but handle HTML error pages (like 504)
+                let errorMsg = "Error communicating with server.";
+                try {
+                    const data = await response.json();
+                    if (data.detail) errorMsg = data.detail;
+                    else if (data.answer) errorMsg = data.answer;
+                } catch (e) {
+                    errorMsg = `Server Error: ${response.status} ${response.statusText}`;
+                }
+                
+                const loadingEl = document.getElementById(loadingId);
+                if (loadingEl) loadingEl.remove();
+                addMessage('error', errorMsg);
             }
 
         } catch (error) {
diff --git a/native_crumbcore_v1/nginx/crumbforest-locations.conf b/native_crumbcore_v1/nginx/crumbforest-locations.conf
index 7f0d114..77fc73a 100644
--- a/native_crumbcore_v1/nginx/crumbforest-locations.conf
+++ b/native_crumbcore_v1/nginx/crumbforest-locations.conf
@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@ location / {
     # Timeouts
     proxy_connect_timeout 60s;
     proxy_send_timeout 60s;
-    proxy_read_timeout 60s;
+    proxy_read_timeout 300s;
     
     # Buffering
     proxy_buffering on;