The rescue team searched Mt. Whitney on Saturday is searching for a Texas man who went missing this week while trying to clear a very cold and snowy mountain.
Taylor Rodriguez, a 29-year-old from San Antonio, isolated himself Monday, according to the Inyo County Sheriff’s Office, despite icy roads, an ominous weather forecast and information that friends say was limited to an indoor gym.
The search continues in Mount Whitney for missing hiker Taylor Rodriguez, described as 5 feet 9, 160 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes. He is believed to have been trying to summit Mount Whitney on Monday, when he disappeared.
(Inyo County Search & Rescue)
“Most of us don’t understand what made him get in his car, drive to Whitney and do this on his own accord,” said family friend Susana Guerra, a veteran hiker and climber. “He’s a very smart kid, really smart, and it’s hard to understand what he was thinking.”
Family and friends of Rodriguez contacted an officer Thursday after they had not heard from him. Authorities found the truck he drove from Texas in a parking lot near the highway entrance.
Volunteer teams from Inyo County Search & Rescue were searching for Rodriguez on the main trail of Mt. Whitney and planned to investigate a more difficult route known as the Mountaineer’s Trail. Sheriff’s spokeswoman Lindsey Stine said crews hope to use a helicopter to search, depending on the weather.
In the five days since Rodriguez disappeared, temperatures have plummeted to new highs overnight with Friday’s wind gusts of more than 50 mph.
“Right now they are still looking for him as if he is alive,” said Stine. “There have been lost people who have been able to stay for days at a time.”
Mt. Whitney is the highest point in the US outside of Alaska at 14,405 feet. In the warmer months, hikers have been known to make the 20-mile round trip some years in fleece jackets and hiking boots. It is so popular between May and November that around 100,000 people participate in the annual permit lottery.
In winter, it can be a very different story. Waist-deep snow, ice fields, avalanches and the risk of hypothermia and frostbite make the mountain a very dangerous proposition. The climbers are usually veterans armed with crampons, ice axes, helmets, ropes and a thorough knowledge of the trail, said Dave Miller, a mountain guide who has encountered Whitney 80 times.
“Trying to do it one day in the winter will be reserved for people with more experience and maybe using skis to go down faster,” Miller said.
Rodriguez with his dog Dutch in 2015.
(Melanie Jaramillo)
Rodriguez, who trained in petroleum engineering and construction, had no background and only started riding at an indoor gym a few months ago, according to people who knew him.
“He was really good at hunting. His family lives on a farm with cows. So outdoors, yes, but hiking… no,” said Melanie Jaramillo, who had a high school crush on Rodriguez and stayed in touch with him.
It is believed that he left the trail at 1 am that day with plans to meet and return the same day. It’s not clear if he took crampons or other equipment to navigate the icy trails or how much research he did about the trails and conditions.
Guerra, who is Jaramillo’s sister, has met Whitney eight times and said that although she understands the area well, she had to be rescued last spring. He said it was hard to imagine Rodriguez in the snow and darkness.
“He couldn’t get far,” she said.
Jaramillo said his high school friends, who knew him as a star football player and student at Southwest High School, are in a state of shock and sadness.
“This man was not dumb,” she said.
Rodriguez is 5-foot-9 and about 160 pounds. The sheriff’s department is asking hikers who encountered him on the trail between Monday and Thursday or who have other information that could help locate him to call (760) 878-0383.
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