by Joseph Exton
Feelings of cold and extreme unease for no apparent reason,
Doors opening and closing on their own.
Some of these events were witnessed by a number of people simultaneously and some are backed-up by photographs and videos. Accounts by eyewitnesses include:
"I'm not a true believer in all of that stuff. But I saw what I saw. One day I saw an officer in khakis descending the ladder to the next deck. I followed him and he was gone. I have no explanation for it."
Alan McKean
“I was sitting in my office when it got really cold. I saw a man in a blue uniform. He was clear as day, like you or I, but he wasn’t making any eye contact. He was sort of slow moving. There was a bulkhead there, and he walked right through the bulkhead.”
Heidi Schave
A number of psychic investigators and crews from television shows such as Ghost Hunters have visited the USS Hornet and all have agreed that the ship is haunted by a number of entities, many of them seemingly former crew members.
A modern warship just isn’t the kind of place that we normally associate with ghostly experiences, but it does seem that this giant ship is more haunted than many of the locations that are more traditionally associated with ghosts...
Chapter 6:
Haunted Roads
The A75, Scotland
The A75 is a major and very busy Scottish trunk road linking Stranraer and its ports on the west coast with the M74, the main west coast north/south route. The A75 has the reputation of being Scotland’s most haunted road, with a fifteen mile stretch between the towns of Annan and Dumfries which is known as the Kinmount Straight seemingly the worst affected.
The first reports of haunting on this stretch of road date from 1957 when a truck driver reported to police that he thought that he had run over a couple who suddenly appeared at the side of the road as he was driving between Annan and Dumfries, but when he checked, the shaken man could find no trace of the pedestrians.
One of the most dramatic sightings was made by two brothers, Norman and Derek Ferguson, in 1962. The brothers were returning to their home in Annan after a one week holiday touring Scotland in their father’s car. Derek, 22, was driving while his younger brother Norman, 14, occupied the passenger seat.
Late in the evening, they had filled up with petrol in Dumfries and were driving on the Kinmount Straight towards their home when their encounter began when a chicken suddenly flew into the light of their headlights and towards the windscreen. The two young men barely had time to brace themselves for the impact when the chicken disappeared.
Moments later the brothers saw an old woman running towards them on the road, her arms held out, then she too disappeared. She was followed by a man with long hair who screamed as he ran towards the car and then a whole parade of animals including “great cats, wild dogs, goats, more hens and other fowl, and stranger creatures”. All these creatures also disappeared before they reached the car, which by now had come to a complete stop...
Both brothers noticed that the temperature had dropped suddenly and that the van was shaking violently from side to side, as if it was being moved by an unknown and invisible force. Derek got out to see what was happening, and the shaking stopped.
When he got back into the car, the brothers saw the final apparition – what appeared to be a large furniture van was bearing down on the car when, at the last possible moment, it too disappeared. The story was widely reported in the Scottish press, but no-one was able to offer a prosaic explanation for the strange things that the brothers had seen.
During the next fifty years, reports of strange sightings on this stretch of road continued to surface. Many spoke of a couple (some described them as wearing dark, Victorian clothing) who would suddenly appear on the road. Some reports noted that, while the face of the woman looked normal, the man’s face lacked eyes.
Other people reported seeing single figures. In 1995 a local couple, Garston and Monica Miller, were driving on the Kinmount Straight when a man who appeared to be wearing a hessian sack rushed out in front of their car. They thought that they must have hit him, but when they stopped the car, they could find no trace of the man. They reported the incident to the Police in Annan.
Another local woman, Donna Maxwell was driving in the same location with her two children in 1997 when a man wearing a red top and dark trousers stepped out in front of her car without warning. Donna instinctively shut her eyes as she braked, but she felt no impact.
She stopped the car and could find no trace of the man, but she was so certain that she must have hit him that she reported the matter to Dumfries Police who appealed in the local press for witnesses or for the man himself to come forward. No-one responded to this appeal for information.
Bon Sturgeon lived beside the A75 and at one time ran a snack van at Carrutherstown, near the Kinmount Straight. He became used to shaken drivers pulling in for a cup of tea after a ghostly encounter, often lorry drivers who were driving alone and late at night. Sturgeon said:
“There was very rarely a week went past without somebody telling me about some experience, and usually along that Kinmount Straight.”
The A75 near Carrutherstown, close to the spot where Bob Sturgeon ran a snack van.
Photo: Oliver Dixon
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:A75_east_of_Carrutherstown_-_geograph.org.uk_-_568903.jpg
One lorry driver who spoke to Bob Sturgeon had parked overnight in a lay-by on the Kinmount Straight. He woke in the early hours of the morning to see a whole parade of ghostly figures passing his truck. They all looked bedraggled and some were carrying bundles or pushing small handcarts. All disappeared a short distance later along the road. Sturgeon said:
“He had been parked on the Kinmount Straight and he had woken up at the back of three in the morning and he saw this “parade” of people.
He said that it went on for ages and he had just frozen – he was in an awful state. It doesn’t matter if you blame it on imagination or fact or whatever, it certainly affected him badly.”
Sightings of strange figures who jump in front of cars on the A75 continue to the present day – sightings of the man in the red top first reported by Donna Maxwell in 1997 are particularly common. No-one knows why this particular road should be the location for so many paranormal encounters but the A75, and especially the stretch between Annan and Dumfries is still known locally as the “ghost road” and many locals are very wary of driving in this area after dark.
A3 Motorway, Croatia
The Autocesta A3 is a motorway which runs east/west across Croatia and connects the city of Zagreb with the Slavonia Region. One stretch of this very busy motorway, between Staro Petrovo Selo and Nova Gradiška and close to the Bosnian border, has a reputation for being haunted.
A number of drivers have reported seeing ghostly figures and other strange creatures on this stretch of the road and, unfortunately, there also have been a large number of fatal accidents in this area. However, the area’s dark reputation is connected with two particular deaths on this stretch of road.
The Autocesta A3
Photo: Frka
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Autoput.jpg
Todor "Toše" Proeski was a multi-talented and massively popular Macedonian singer, songwriter and actor who was named “The Elvis of the Balkans” by BBC news. On 5th October 2007, Toše held a concert to raise funds for the Primary Education Project, a part of USAID.
Over 40,000 people attended the concert which was also televised worldwide and raised many thousands of dollars for Macedonian schools. In the early morning of 16th October, Toše was a passenger in a car being driven on the A3 motorway near Nova Gradiška. Toše was asleep in the front passenger seat when, for reasons that were never completely explained, the car collided with a truck and then hit the central barrier of the motorway. Toše was killed instantly though neither of the other two people in the car were seriously injured.
; Almost exactly seven years later, on 23rd October 2013, thirty-two year old Dolores Lambaša, star of several Croatian television soaps and movies, was travelling as a passenger in a car on the same stretch of motorway. Like Toše Proeski, Dolores Lambaša was asleep in the front passenger seat of the car when, for unknown reasons, it left the motorway and collided with the crash barrier at the side of the motorway.
In another bizarre coincidence, when the car in which Lambaša was travelling finally came to rest, it was just fifty meters from the site of Toše Proeski’s fatal accident...
Many locals claim that this stretch of the A3 motorway is cursed (there were 54 other deaths on this stretch of road between the deaths of Toše Proeski and Dolores Lambaša), though no-one has been able to provide any reason for this. Drivers continue to report seeing strange creatures and shadowy figures on the road and the number of fatal accidents does seem very high for what seems to be a modern, safe stretch of road.
Like many of the other haunted roads described in this section, locals tend to avoid this stretch of the A3, especially after dark.
E8 Expressway, Malaysia
The E8 Expressway was opened in 1977 and links Kuala Lumpur with the city of Karak and the Sempah Pass, a mountain pass which gives access to the resort area of the Genting Highlands. The narrow, twisting road is known as the Karak Highway and passes a number of steep ravines and gorges.
This road has been the scene of a number of serious accidents and fatalities - One particular multi-vehicle accident left seventeen people dead and unfortunately there have been many other accidents involving deaths. Perhaps because of this, this road has the reputation of being haunted by a number of strange entities...
One of the best-known apparitions associated with this road is a phantom, yellow Volkswagen Beetle car. It is said that several drivers have come upon the yellow Beetle on this road, driving very slowly, and always late at night and when the road is quiet. If the driver overtakes the Beetle, then soon after they come upon another yellow Beetle, driving very slowly, which they are forced to overtake.
This will go on for some time, with multiple instances of the yellow Beetle being passed until, seeming to tire of the game, the ghost car will speed off and disappear. Those brave enough to look closely at the phantom Beetle report that there is no-one in the driving seat…
Another phantom reported by a number of drivers on this road is the ghost of a young boy who is bleeding from both eyes and wanders the road calling for his mother. This is said to be the ghost of a young boy who was killed when the car he was in, driven by his mother, ran off the road and fell into one of the steep ravines which border the road.
Both mother and son were flung through the windscreen on impact, and both were blinded by broken glass. Their bodies were discovered some distance apart and it is believed that the ghost of the young boy is still trying to find the body of his mother.
However, perhaps the oddest story connected with the Karak Highway is that it is haunted by a Pontianak, a type of Malaysian vampire. According to Malay folklore, a Pontianak may be created when a woman dies during childbirth, turning her into a vengeful member of the undead who haunts a specific area.
The Pontianak is a hideous looking creature with long fangs and claws which is capable of flying. However, the Pontianak is also able to appear as a beautiful woman dressed in white. The Pontianak is said to eat babies and to kill and castrate men who are beguiled by her attractive appearance.
There have been many reports of strange creatures flying above the Karnak Highway and several people have reported a ghostly but beautiful woman dressed in white standing beside the road.
It is believed that this is the Pontianak who will attack and kill any man unwary enough to stop to offer her a lift...
Conclusion
Hopefully you will now realise that the ideal location for a ghost hunt is probably not a spooky old house, a graveyard or a desolate forest. Ghosts seem to be attracted to much more populated places including hotels and bars, airports, railway stations and even busy roads.
But then, if you think about it logically, this makes perfect sense. Ghosts, after all, are said to be the spirits of dead people. And what could be more understandable than that these spirits would choose to return to places that were important to them in life? And the places that we humans tend to visit most are places where we will be with other humans.
Perhaps ghosts also populate shopping malls, footballs grounds and concert venues and we simply fail to recognise them as ghosts?
The only problem is, this may make it very difficult to avoid ghosts in our everyday lives! Next time you’re enjoying yourself in a crowded bar or waiting for a train or an aircraft, take a close look around. Perhaps those people next to you aren’t being rude or anti-social. Perhaps they’re actually ghosts…
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