The Sting of the Assassin (Cont.)

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Outside Magazine October 2001

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The Sting of the Assassin (Cont.)

ABOUT A YEAR earlier, late in the OctoberApril wet season, two spawning Chironex fleckeri released sperm and eggs into a river estuary not far from Gil and Mary's isolated beach. Joining in the warm water, the two cells soon grew into a minute ball—the planula, as this stage is called—and dropped to the river bottom, attaching to the underside of a rock. There the planula sprouted the beginnings of a crown of tentacles and grew into a tiny polyp that by the end of the dry season had metamorphosed into a small jellyfish. Just ahead of the monsoon rains, the Chironex propelled itself out of the estuary and into the Coral Sea.

For the next few months it gently pulsed through calm waters along the coast, feeding and growing, avoiding violent currents and waves that could tear its delicate tissues. Its body, an almost-transparent milky white, 95 percent water, developed into a graceful bell shape with a squarish, four-cornered bottom rim—thus the name box jellyfish. By filling its bell with water and squeezing it out like an umbrella opening and closing, the jelly could jet along at speeds up to four miles per hour. A limb shaped like a chicken's foot dangled from each of the four corners of the bell's rim and from these grew the jelly's tentacles, as many as 15 per limb. Only a quarter of an inch in diameter and stretching more than 15 feet when fully extended, the tentacles resembled twisted lengths of skinny—and highly charged—electrical conduit.

Using primitive eyes to help it spot large objects, the jelly followed schools of shrimp that congregated just off the sandy beaches. Sensitive to strong sunlight, it lingered near the sea floor during the height of the day, rising toward the surface as the sunlight weakened in late afternoon, trailing its long tentacles behind it, trolling for prey. When a shrimp or a small fish came past, inadvertently brushing a tentacle, it died almost instantly. The Chironex would then reel in the catch, feeding the meaty morsel into wide, grasping lips.

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