Snowy windy day above 8500' on Carson Pass.

I toured on the Northside of Carson pass to look for new snow totals, recent wind loading, and the status of reported surface hoar. It was clear that there was a big temperature swing this morning. Driving up the pass the rain line had stopped around 8500'. Trees below this elevation had no more snow and clearly showed lower elevations had received rain for a while. Above 8500', there was about 5-10cm of new snow, it was mostly heavy compressing into a tight ball. The wind was strong out of the W-SW and was causing alot of transportation of recent snow. Throughout the day the snow fall was intermittent spots of heavy S-1 to S-2 totals and then would break up to a glimpse at the sun. Accumilation was occuring under these conditions and was allowing for good transportaion and loading while snow was falling. Several small wind loaded features showed cracking and a good slab development occuring. It was clear that cornice buildup and wind drifts had been developing quickly.  I did find a debris pile from recent cornice fall but it appeared to be during a warmer spell as there was pinwheels within it. I dug a pit in a protected area where I thought there was the potential for buried surface hoar. I did fine some eveidence there, as multiple shovel tilt and compression tests displayed signs of weakness right below the new 10cm of snow. However, I walked around to several other protected north facing areas and found no other eveidence of buried surface hoar. By the time I toured back to the truck around 1430, the snow had diminshed and skies were breaking up again, the ambient air temperature was just above freezing at 33F.