Haunted Police Headquarters

[Mike D.]

http://www.myinky.com/ecp/gleaner_news/article/0,1626,ECP_4476_2232068,00.html

[SquishyDave]

Quite well balanced for a change.

[Candace]

Wilson, meanwhile, said he thinks the strange occurrences can be explained, which he hopes the ghost hunters will do.

"Because the fear of the unknown is probably one of the biggest fears that humans have," Wilson said.


...snip...

"The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown." ~~ Howard Phillips Lovecraft, esq.

Nice to see that HPL is still agreed with even in this very scientific age we live in...

[Brown]

This story had also been picked up by the New York Times web site. (http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Haunted-Police-Station.html)

My own home creaks and cracks like crazy, and I can certainly understand how someone could hear those creaks and cracks and think that the house is haunted. The rational part of my brain, however, overrules the irrational part.

Curiously, I saw something that looked like a ghost last night. As I was driving home in the dark, my headlights shone on a silver, shimmering figure crossing the road in front of me. This figure was not an animal, as it appeared to be walking upright. In fact, it looked like a person with a sheet over him, except that it was not solid, because I could see through it. The appearance of this thing was quite startling.

What was it?

Well, it turned out to have a perfectly ordinary explanation. One of my neighbors has an automatic lawn-watering system, and his system was watering his lawn at night. One of the sprinklers was improperly adjusted, so it shot a little arch-like spray of water out into the street. As the sprinkler swept the spray in a counter-clockwise direction, the spray appeared to cross the street at about the same speed as a man would cross the street. The headlights on my car were on low beam, so I saw only the lower part of the water arch, which appeared to be about as tall as a person.

The result was an apparently ghostly entity, crossing the street in front of my car.

[arcticpenguin]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=817&ncid=757&e=10&u=/ap/20030905/ap_on_fe_st/haunted_police_station

"The way I treat it is not that there is a ghost, there's just things that I can't explain," said Officer John Wilson, who contacted the Scientific Investigative Ghost Hunting Team, based in Louisville.

The team of professional paranormal investigators gave the brick building a preliminary review and will return this fall for a thorough probe. The group will set up cameras and tape recorders as well as infrared thermometers to capture any temperature variations.

The goal is to try to prove the strange occurrences aren't caused by paranormal forces, said Kay Owen, vice president of the nonprofit ghost hunting team, which doesn't charge for its services.

Does anyone have more info on this Scientific Investigative Ghost Hunting Team? Are they affiliated with any larger skeptical organizations? Someone could write a nice report on this for one of the skeptic mags.

They have a web site: http://www.sightonline.com/index.html

[Andonyx]

Originally posted by arcticpenguin


Does anyone have more info on this Scientific Investigative Ghost Hunting Team? Are they affiliated with any larger skeptical organizations? Someone could write a nice report on this for one of the skeptic mags.



Hmmm, some of the phrasing on their photos / EVP page leads me to believe they are not exactly skeptics.


Here is the same tape professionally slowed down by 50%. Do you hear anything different?

How do you professionally slow something down?

[arcticpenguin]

Originally posted by Andonyx


Hmmm, some of the phrasing on their photos / EVP page leads me to believe they are not exactly skeptics.



How do you professionally slow something down? [/B]
1) When's the last time someone admitted, "Yes, I'm gullible. I'd believe anything!"

2) Put a finger on the reel?

[Garrette]

Oh, my. Knowing Kentucky as I do, I shouldn't be surprised at this, but it is still disheartening.

I have worked in Simpsonville, Kentucky, which is about 6 miles west of Shelbyville, and my work required me to frequently visit Shelbyville, including the occasional trip to the police station.

If you look up 303 Main Street, Shelbyville, Kentucky, on an internet map site, you will notice that a train track is only two blocks away.

In addition, Main Street is in this case actually a well-traveled thoroughfare, including by semi-trailers/tractor-trailers.

I would be surprised if the doors did not jiggle and if there were not knocks and bumps.

Can't explain the "column of heat" thing, but if that's all there is then I'd hesitate before calling it paranormal.

[Nucular]

Okay, regarding the EVP recordings - I'm listening on a pair of crappy speakers at work - what are you supposed to be able to hear?

And although their website does sometimes employ phraseology that make you think 'hmmm', they do sound more open minded than, oh, say the ghost hunters at GhostWeb (http://www.ghostweb.com).

I want to be a ghost hunter!

[Nucular]

Originally posted by Brown
The result was an apparently ghostly entity, crossing the street in front of my car. I've had a couple of similar ones. When I find myself driving back from a nearby village at night, invariably I get a slight start as I see a hooded figure just standing by the side of the road, watching me - as I slow down and stare, though, he resolves into a triangular road sign, facing the opposite way to me, which for some reason looks dintinctly anthropomorphic as the headlights sweep it. Even though I know it's there, it's always slightly creepy for a moment - if I'd speeded up and not slowed down when I first saw it, and if I was of a certain disposition, I might be convinced I'd seen a ghost.

Another one was when I was at university a few years ago - in the dusk, I walked to the shop, and saw a person, wearing a peaked cap, leaning on a wall. As I approached, he just literally dissolved, right before my eyes! I froze for a moment, wondering what had just happened, then walked back up the street and retraced my steps. This chap in the cap was there again, and as I walked more slowly, I realised he was an optical illusion, made of a gap in a hedge, a garage door some way further down the street, and a couple of other ingredients. As I approached, perspective made the ingredients move apart, dissolving the figure - in the poor light, I'd wrongly interpreted what I was seeing.

Either of these would have made a classic ghost story, if I hadn't bothered to check. Easy mistake, but it annoys me when people adamantly say "I know what I saw!" and never give an inch, when failures of perception and memory are so possible.

[Dragon]

Shelbyville? Huh! What do they know?
If you want to see a real ghost you gotta come to Springfield -
http://www.phobos-deimos.com/Treehouse_Of_Horror/simpsons4_small.jpg

[welshdean]

Originally posted by Dragon:
Shelbyville? Huh! What do they know? If you want to see a real ghost you gotta come to Springfield -
Did you notice this.......
Originally posted by Garrette:
I have worked in Simpsonville
hey, hey!!

By the way Dragon, nice avatar!!

[Garrette]

Man, o, man, the synchronicity is spoooooky.

I also have a friend named Homer.

I'm sleeping with my head under the blanket tonight.:eek:

[Andonyx]

Originally posted by arcticpenguin



2) Put a finger on the reel?

You know they actually have machines with knobs just for that now....

Of course they're professional models......ooooooooohhhhhhh.