[icebadger]

May god comfort the love ones of those fishermen and may they rest in peace.. that place freezes weirdly, the ice takes some time to get safe due to the wind and the depth of the water. You should only be fishing over shallow water this early in the season and should use a spud bar to check the ice as you go,with the up and down temps we get at this time of the year you should also have a PFD[PERSONAL FLOTATION DEVICE] and a pair of picks on as well because you never know what you are walking on.. remember the guy that fell through monksville res? sounds like the same thing happend at splitrock. please use your heads folks it is not safe this early in new jersey.it is not like it used to be back in the old days when we had cold weather that was not interrupted by warm spells in December and January.