Mount Whitney, Direct East Face, Winter Ascent. In February M ike

M ount W hitney, D irect E a st F ace, W inter A scent. In February M ik e G raber, R on K auk, and I skied into the cirque under M ount W hitney to attem pt the long G rade V route to the left o f the norm al east face. A fter setting up cam p we fixed a pitch up to the base o f a prom inent dihedral that eventually joins the standard route after 1200 feet o f Y osem ite-style clim bing. Before daw n the next m orning we set out w ithout bivy gear, hoping to get up and down the route in a day. A lthough tem peratures were well below freezing, the cracks w ere in quite good condition and easy to protect w ith Friends and chocks. M ost o f the clim bing was 5.7 to 5.9 cracks and chim neys, but at the m ost difficult spot, an overhanging off-w idth crack bypassed by a bolt ladder, a trem endous noise that sounded as if a m ajor part o f the face was com ing dow n put our hearts in our stom achs. Ron, who was leading at the tim e, tried to thrust his body into the crack to avoid what seem ed at the m om ent to be inevitable death from above. A m icro-second later a m ilitary jet that had ju st broken the sound barrier w hooshed past at the level of the sum m it. R on ’s cheek was bleeding, and if we had been arm ed there is little doubt in our m inds that the plane would have suffered three direct hits. W ithout bivy gear we m oved quickly enough to reach the sum m it by m id-afternoon and to descend the M ountaineer’s R oute back to cam p by dusk. W e believe that this classic route that catches the first m orning sun had never before been clim bed in w inter, although records o f w inter clim bs in the High Sierra are not well kept. (V , 5 .9 , A l . ) G alen A . R owell