Weak snow collapsing on NE aspects in beehive

We were one basin north of Bear basin on the NE ramp of Bear Peak (10400'). We were on a NNE aspect of the ramp taking off our skis to dig a pit when we noticed how rotten the snow was, boot pen was immediately up to our waste. My partner noticed a subtle collapse and a couple seconds later we both felt and audibly heard a larger collapse. There were a few shooting cracks about 5-8 feet up the slope from us and arcing about 10 feet across the slope. We gingerly put our skis back on and traversed down and away from to a low angle bench. 

Digging hasty hand pits and probing with our poles we continued to notice hard crusts and slabs with weak snow beneath them on E and NE aspects protected from the sun but less so on anything slightly south facing or west. During a quick column test on a SE aspect at about 10200' the result was CT14.