Two mistakes.... They shouldn’t have scattered and they should have been armed. Bear spray actually works quite well... if this is an area which was known to see occasional bears, taking spray along is a must.
Why didn’t they refer to it as a teenaged bear, or a youth bear?
Being armed is illegal in NJ pretty much.
Bear spray has NOT been shown to be effective against black bears (as opposed to brown bears). I’m pretty sure bear spray is illegal in NJ anyway.
They should have stayed together and attacked the bear by throwing rocks or whatever they could.
I have hiked Apshawaw many, many times. Bears are common and it’s not really remote at all. The trails pass by several backyards.
“if this is an area which was known to see occasional bears...”
Black bear sightings are extremely common (almost daily) in the area where these folks were hiking. They were unprepared for the dangers of that locality and it cost one of them their life.