As cold as it was, they still could have used more ice, the lead instructor said.
It wasn't the cold Greg Mactye was complaining about Saturday.
"We didn't have as much ice as we'd like to have had," he said.
An inch and a half to two inches over the Merrill Creek Reservoir in Harmony Township would have been ideal for the Garden State Underwater Recovery Unit's annual ice rescue training seminar.
Some tips to deal with the cold
At that thickness, it starts to crack under would-be rescuers' feet and gives them a realistic portrayal of an emergency situation, said Mactye, the lead instructor.
But even with the thin layer they had, the training went off without a hitch as 40 people from local rescue and fire agencies learned how to handle such precarious situations from the shore and in the water -- with wetsuits, of course.
Steve Novak may be reached at snovak@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @type2supernovak. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.