Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board What was that white glider thingy?

I was going up and down Split Mt from Red Lake on Sat (what a wonderfully brutal hike/climb that is for a weekend warrior from San Diego like myself). I had the entire east side and north slope to myself until I heard an odd whirring/whining sound from above while sucking the thin air going up the final class 3 rocks to gain the north slope. I looked up and not too far overhead came a white glider that freaked me out momentarily. It smoothly crossed over toward Mt Prater and vanished. After reaching the summit and coming back down about an hour later, it came back. I think it had the letters "BK" on it. Anyone know what that was/is?

UFO?

Did it look & sound like this ?

Jeff:
Was that a drone of some sort?
BK? Maybe a Burger King commercial. Ha.

Literally? Yes. However, since altitude doesn't affect me that much, and the fact that I didn't see a little green man waving at me (I was that close to it) I don't think it came from outer space...I could be wrong.

Ah hah! Jeff, that's the one. What is it?

I think there was some glider convention going on.

I saw a bunch of them parked on the road near the Horseshoe Meadows campground. A little far from where you were at, but on Saturday, I saw gliders, parachute jumpers, etc all over the place around Lone Pine.

Here's the glider over Mt. Sill on Saturday. There's actually three letters on the bottom of its wing:

Nice shot, Kurt.

The one over Whitney Saturday was BK as the OP mentioned:



But I think this glider was the coolest:



(Makes me want to take up a new hobby...)

What it's like inside those things:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjTmNJmJXbk

Do those letters by chance say "SMI"?????

Yes, that's why it was the coolest one... [smiley goes here]

not the same weather, but the best Whitney glider video I know - at about 3:50 they go down the North Fork in a hurry

I saw one (possibly two - but I thought the same one had returned) while taking a nice long break at Outpost Camp on Saturday. It was quite graceful to watch for the couple minutes it was in view =)

Best advertising ever. I saw the Glider from the Summit of Sill (also got a great shot) on Sunday. Dropping skittles from the cockpit?

I saw those on two different occasions, in July and August, circling east of Mt Langley. No idea what this is about.

No, Kurt. That's "IWS"