Warm temps at Blue Lakes

Location Name: 
Blue Lake
Region: 
Carson Pass Area
Date and time of observation: 
Thu, 12/08/2016 - 11:40
Location Map: 
United States
38° 39' 42.426" N, 119° 55' 40.8072" W
See map: Google Maps
US


Red Flags: 
Rapid warming
Observation made by: Public
Snowpit Observations
More detailed information about the snowpack: 

Above freezing air temps and rain affected the snow surface at observed elevations from 7000' to 8500'. The top 5cm of the pit profile was wet and saturated. This layer is suspect to freezing and forming a crust and/or bed surface for future snow.  Near the end of the day a slight crust was forming around 13:45 as temps had began to go below freezing. Despite this wet/heavy upsidedown layer, the rest of the pit was well consolidated and cohesive rounded grains. Stability tests showed no results in either PST or ECT. Compression test resulted with CT13 Q3 20cm from the surface. All together there was no signs of instability. 

Pic 1: Smoothed glazed surface from rain, solar radiation and warm ambient temps.

Pic 2: CT results @ 20cm

Snowpit or crown profile photo or graph: 
Snowpack photos: 
Weather Observations
Blowing Snow: 
No
Cloud Cover: 
75% of the sky covered by clouds
Air temperature: 
Above Freezing
Wind Speed: 
Moderate
Precipitation: 
Mixed rain and snow
Air temperature trend: 
Cooling
Wind Direction: 
Southwest
Accumulation rate: 
None
More detailed information about the weather: 

The weather consisted of broken cloud cover with intermintent waves of sunshine and precipitation in the form of either light rain or snow. Wind was consistent out of the SW @ 14mph with gust up to 20. No transporting of snow was observed.