Haunting diary entries belonging to a couple that was left behind in shark-infested waters have been revealed.
In January 1998, an American couple, Tom and Eileen Lonergan, had been traveling the world when they decided to board their scuba dive boat, Outer Edge, to explore an area of the Great Barrier Reef off the Australian coast.
After completing two 40-minute dives, the pair were preparing for a third at a site known as Fish City, an area notorious for its large shark population.
However, after resurfacing, they found that their dive boat had disappeared, leaving them stranded in the open ocean.
According to the Daily Record, the Lonergans, who met at Louisiana State University and worked with the US Peace Corps in Tuvalu and Fiji, stayed submerged far longer than advised and the crew’s safety checks missed them.
When the boat returned to Port Douglas that evening, their belongings, including their dive bags, were left unclaimed and overlooked.
It wasn’t until two days later that the crew realized the mistake, but by then, the damage had been done.
Following the couple's disappearance, their personal diaries were found in their hostel room in Cairns. The contents provided disturbing insights into their mindset leading up to their tragic fate.
In his diary, Tom wrote: “I feel as though my life is complete and I'm ready to die.” This unsettling entry, dated six months before the couple's disappearance, continued with: “As far as I can tell, from here my life can only get worse. It has peaked and it's all downhill from here until my funeral.”
Eileen’s journal entries were equally chilling, as just 16 days before the couple went missing, she wrote about Tom’s indifferent attitude toward death.
“Tom hopes to die a quick and fairly painless death, and he hopes it happens soon. Tom's not suicidal, but he's got a death wish that could lead him to what he desires, and I could get caught in that," she penned.
Despite exhaustive efforts from rescue teams, the Lonergans’ remains were never recovered.
Their tragic story inspired the 2003 film Open Water, which depicted a similar scenario of being stranded in shark-infested waters.
To capture the terror and panic the couple would have experienced, real sharks were allowed to swim around the actors, with cameras attached to buoys to provide a terrifyingly close perspective. Tuna chunks were thrown into the water to keep the sharks away from the cast.