Hi OP,
That picture was nothing out of the ordinary from all the ones I saw and worked with.
One thing that can also cause that is the sides of the Auger Housing deflecting outwards, warping with temperature changes, which is normal around here,They are designed for that, damage from being struck or jamming into a pile of icy snow and bulldozing it through it while going into it at an angle. There are many different things that can cause that. Our temperatures around here change wildly from day to day and that causes all kinds of distortion on everything, metal, machinery, buildings, roadways, you name it. We are used to it. We don't get gradual temp changes around here that stay steady, it fluctuates wildly here.
That is another reason the augers are designed to be able to "Deflect" and are "Springy". They have to be able to "Flex" a lot.
If the side of the housing is warped out, it will pull the auger away from the mounting boss, or flange, they give it so many different names. It will get pulled away as long as the bearing in the side of the housing is still bolted fast. If you unbolt the side auger shaft bearing from the side of the housing, you will be able to move it inwards to fasten it to the mounting boss easier, then you will have to squeeze the side of the housing inwards to fasten the bearing mounting bolts, and the augers will "Spring Back Out".
We had made up a custom "C Clamp to squeeze the housings together in some cases because they had warped out like that, and also on brand new machines that were like that.
I've seen elongated holes caused by non shear bolts,"Hardened" bolts being used.
They can usually handle ice chunks pretty well around here. Most of the problems were caused by either a scraper and skids set too high so that the auger would hit the ground too easily, and rip the teeth off of it, and we also have the "Best Roadways" in the country here, as the whole world knows of Pennsyltuckys horrendously terrible road quality with heaving lumps, potholes, curbs jumping up out of the ground, sewer inspection caps that heave up out of the ground and are struck, causing damage. "Out of Staters" moving into the area that never saw snow in their life before, and never used a snowblower, it was a real "Treat" watching the damage they do with snowblowers. That keeps us busy, repairing the carnage they do to machinery and automobiles.Most of their "Carnage" was broken shear bolts and destroyed Augers.
It sounds like you have personal machinery like I do age wise, the "Older the Better", and they were built to last much better than the new stuff. A lot of my new equipment is around 25 years old.