Avalanche: Reynolds East Face

Saw multiple signs of avalanching on our way to Reynolds Peak, road cuts and stream banks had widespread shallow crowns. With a heavy upside down snowpack, and strong winds combined with a slick bed surface we where fairly sure there would be avalanche activity on the E face of Reynolds. Once we arrived there it was obvious that the whole E facing shoulder of Reynolds from the most N slide path to the middle of the bowl had avalanched naturally, 1000ft plus in width. I assume a natural cornice drop triggered it seeing that they were thick, overhanging and dropping on their own. Cracking was widespread on the ridgeline and on the E facing slopes. The weak layer was light density snow from earlier in the week which had denser wind driven snow on top, basically a dense slab sitting on fragile light density snow that could not support the weight. The slide was fairly shallow 10 to12 inches deep and did not run to the bottom of the drainage but the width and connectivity was impressive. We went down the bed surface of the farthest N slide path and noted a slick melt freeze crust under the weak light density snow, which it ran on. This part of the slide ran about 300ft or so, not enough visibility to see how far the rest of it ran, it was getting blown in fast. With continued heavy snow and wind I would expect the avalanches to get larger.

photos: the part of the slide on the Northern end, multiple stress fractures on the slope, cornice drops and shallow crowns on stream banks.