HomeAfrica-NewsGhost hunters use technology to harness the supernatural

Ghost hunters use technology to harness the supernatural

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Shortly after dark, flashlight in hand, Rivas Bright taps twice on the broken window of an abandoned building in Pretoria.

“Yet!” he tells his fellow ghost hunters. They hold their breath, waiting for an answer from the shadows.

It’s been about two years since Bright created The Upsidedown, a group of paranormal enthusiasts who hunt ghosts in an attempt to prove they’re real.

It’s a daunting task, since spirits are proverbially elusive.

“It’s failed science,” says team member Nigel Mullinder, of the study of paranormal events, which has attracted the interest of researchers and parapsychologists but produced little hard evidence.

Bright and his team of seven “skeptical believers” turned to technology to solve the mystery.

Armed with an arsenal of tools including infrared cameras, motion and heat detectors, radios, and a self-developed app to uncover paranormal activity, they explore “haunted” buildings for clues.

“[We] we need a set of tests that allow us to show that it is not just the wind [blowing] through the window or a door that is closed due to some kind of vibration,” says Mullinder.

Tonight they have gone to an abandoned building on a university campus, who asked not to be identified.

The night guards here have been spooked by creepy noises.

Lucy Tsoeu says that the slamming of doors and the rattling of a typewriter at night have led her to believe that a ghost is haunting.

His colleague, Mpho Mthombeni, says he heard the toilets flush and felt a strange presence when no one was there.

Nigel Mullinder, a member of the team, tries to get back in touch with the spirits, listening to a radio frequency meter while blindfolded.

“What can I do? Do I pray or do I have to speak louder to scare them?” asks Tsoeu.

“Maybe they can cool them down,” he says of the ghost hunters.

Wearing a gray T-shirt and black pants, with a shaved head and pierced ears, Bright, an employee at a chain retail store, says he has heard strange sounds and seen shadows since he was young.

“My mother used to say she spoke to spirits” in her kitchen, she says.

Since founding The Upsidedown, the group has amassed a few thousand followers on social media, spent several thousand dollars on equipment, and scouted about a dozen venues, following ads from locals.

At the university building, the group checks each room, placing their detection tools on a floor covered in dead leaves.

“We’re literally a bunch of guys who stand in the dark, ask questions… and follow the flashing red and green lights,” Bright quips.

Bright rings a bell to tell the ghosts that he wants to talk to them, but there is no response.

“We are not here to hurt anyone or get you out of that place. All we’re looking for are answers,” says Bright.

“Did you hear what? I could clearly hear someone say my name,” says a team member. It’s hard to corroborate.

As the hunt progresses, others, in turn, feel a movement or hear a sigh.

The group has been in this building once before, a month ago.

Then, its members say, they communicated with the spirits of children in a room that was used as a makeshift morgue during the 1980s.

Mullinder tries to make contact again, listening to a radio frequency meter blindfolded.

Everything is filmed to capture potential evidence. But the result is not conclusive.

“I can understand why people would think we’re crazy, but when we finally get that massive, irresolvable evidence… who’s the crazy one then?” brilliant question. — AFP

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