R U willing to put your life on the line?

Ok, I said I wasn’t going to do a blog this month due to working on my upcoming books. But I received a phone call this afternoon from my other half asking if I had read the news about a ghost hunter being killed? No, I hadn’t, so curiosity drove me to the website, and I proceeded to read the tragic story.

Just last night on Aug the 27th of 2010, a group of a dozen ghost hunters went off to investigate the story of a ghost train in Iredell County, NC. It seems that these individuals proceeded to wander off onto active train tracks and onto a bridge. Unaware, they were surprised as a real train came barreling down on them causing investigators to jump 40ft for their lives, but one young man was not so lucky.

Due to the popularity of ghost hunting, stories of this nature are far too common. We find many groups going into unsafe environments for the thrill of the hunt. Where most end in foolish accidents of someone getting hurt or others being arrested for trespassing, some in fact are being killed. In Toronto, CA a woman fell to her death from a building while ghost hunting in 2009. The problem is, this crap should not be happening.

TV shows like Ghost Hunters, Ghost Adventures and others are playing on the viewers excitement of wanting to experience the same types of phenomena they are seeing on these very well edited programs and like the popularity of the MTV show Jackass, where individuals attempt to pull off silly stunts, fans are now trying to recreate what they see on TV. This led to many tragic endings for the viewers imitating their (to be honest) stupidity. Is the same happening with the ghost hunting shows?

Maybe these ghost hunting programs need disclaimers at the beginning and end to tell people that these investigations are done in safe and controlled environments and by somewhat professionals. For there are now too many groups out there who are careless, don’t know what they are doing and are clearly putting their lives and others in danger.

My heart goes out to the family and friends of Christopher Kaiser