So I've spotted one big point release, and a couple of other smaller ones, but no slabs until a couple of days ago. It's very small, the slab doesnt look more than 4 or 6 inches, but it's a slab avalanche nonetheless. this is one of the hills right next to town.
You can see the fracture on that wind loaded cornice thing, and the runout is in that little valley. What happened is this: Lots of wind loaded up that cornice. However, it was relatively stable I guess (saw tracks on top of it a few days ago which I thought was dumb). It kept being windy, and the snow hardened into what is known as wind crust. Wind crust makes a great sliding layer for a slab. So then one day (when I first went to the village) it snowed and was windy at the same time. As before, this small amount of snow collected on the existing cornice thing. It solidified a bit and became what folks call wind loaded. then something happened. Either an animal walked by or it just got heavy enough or something and it fractured and slid.
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