melted battery terminal , bad connection?
 

I was attempting to start my suburban and it was giving me some trouble. Hard cranking and then intermittent starter engagement . Kind of like the sound of a battery going dead. . After letting off the key it didn't seem like the starter stopped making noise. It was making a high-pitched whining noise . I'm not really sure if it was the starter or just the sound of the battery discharging. Popped hood and the battery was smoking . I walked away and let the situation work itself out. The smoked stopped and I walked back to find that the battery terminal had melted out and the cable was laying to the side.

The battery was brand-new but I had started it a few times before without issue. After reading up on this I believe I may have cranked down on the battery terminal too hard resulting in a cracked battery terminal or The washer had been smashed too thin resulting in an intermittent connectivity issue. Does anyone know if this could've caused this strange behavior I observed? It seems unlikely to me that that's the direct cause of the failure observed . what would your diagnostic procedure be before hooking up a new battery? (I am farmilur with a volt and ohm meter)

99 k1500 suburban