My name is Serena Morris and I will never know why I was the only one to survive the terrible ordeal that claimed the lives of both of my associates. I know you need details, Dr. Slater, and I will do my best to provide them. No, I don't mind your taking notes. I have nothing to hide, but I do wish you would lock the door. I must insist that once I begin I do not wish to be interrupted. Now is also the time for you to call in anyone else whom you want to hear my story. I'll go on until you tell me to stop, but I must warn you that I cannot bear to tell it twice.
You wave a finger at me. I assume that means we'll be alone for this session. Then I'll begin. In mid June of 1988 we were three scientists on a sixty five foot boat some two hundred and fifty miles southeast of Bermuda. For us it was a time for study. We all worked for the same chemical plant that was co-sponsoring with the National Geographic Society a bio-geochemical investigation concerning the effects of industrial wastes (PCB) on marine life. Scientifically known as polychlorinated biphenyls, these compounds are used as electrical insulating fluids.
Our company, Megatron, manufactures these products for industrial use in transformers and condensers. These insoluble fluids enter the air through evaporation, especially when they're burned with trash. Unfortunately, they solute into animal and plant fat. Our study concerned the effects of these compounds on marine life, especially in the Sargasso Sea where we received reports about textural and color alterations in the algae indigenous to that area.
Never very far from our minds was the recent disappearance of three of our fellow scientists, Martin Sturgis, Louis Downs and Paul Morgan. These men were the initiators of the study and there had been no trace of them for more than three weeks. I was engaged to Sam DeVane, the head bio-geochemist. John McBride was brilliant too. I'm sorry, Doctor. I don't mean to cry. It's just that they were such vital people. Just give me a moment. I'll get on with it. I know that I must.
The trouble started on the third day. A school of whales attacked our boat and sank it. We found ourselves adrift on a life raft in shark-infested waters. We drifted for days and then the water turned to the deep electric blue that marks the Sargasso. Here we feared that our raft would entangle itself within the sargassum (seaweed) that circle the sea in an endless current and grow in the millions of tons throughout the area. We also found tar balls on the algae, probably the result of oil slicks, which could have mired us in one fatal position.
