"Hello book worms and welcome to OH! For the Love of Books!, This show gives you information from the books I have read or ones you suggest for me to read. I'm your host, Jessica Vickery, and thank you for joining me.
This episode was recorder while on holidays so I apologize if the sound isn’t great.
Haunted Airport
Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi airport is one of two airports serving this popular destination. Suvarnabhumi opened in 2006 and is one of the twenty busiest airports in the world and the sixth busiest airport in Asia.
This airport is also the most haunted airport in the world and ghosts have been blamed for a host of problems.
The problem has become so serious that the airport has built a number of condos specifically to provide attractive housing for ghosts in the hope that this will keep them away from the passenger terminal and aircraft operations.
In the early 70’s a need for the airport was realized, as Don Muang the other airport in Bangkok started life as a US Air Base was struggling to deal with the sheer volume of traffic.
They wanted a space with good rail and road connections to the center of the city.
They found a spot but it had a few problems. One it was snake-infested know as Cobra Swamp, two it also included an old graveyard and Thia people are very nervous about disturbing the resting dead.
Finally in 2002 work began but as most major construction projects there were delays. Some of the delays were caused by frightened construction works. Not only where Cobra’s displaced very aggressively when their swamp was drained, there were frequent reports of ghostly figures moving around on the site. When challenged on how and where they had relocated the bodies from the graveyard on which the airport was built, members of the consortium responsible for building work suddenly became very vague and were unable to remember where precisely the bodies had been re-buried.
Reports of ghosts became so prevalent and caused so many work stoppages that in September 2006 before the airport was open to the public, airport authorities organized a merit-making ceremony for prosperity at the airport.99 respective Buddhist monks from temples and monasteries around Thailand were invited to undertake the ritual chanting required to insure the airport would be free form ghostly interference.
This ceremony was also attended by 350 airport staff in the hopes it would reassure the staff about what had already become known as a haunted building. This was not a notable success.
During the chanting a young parcel inspector, collapsed and the announced that his body is possessed by Pho Ming, the guardian spirit of Cobra swamp. Pho Ming announced that he was displeased because his home had been destroyed by the construction of the airport and demanded a shrine be built for him on the airport ground immediately. So they erected a total of 6 shrines around the airport to appease Pho Ming and other entities which seem to haunt there. Despite this, ghosts continued to appear.
The most commonly seen ghost was Pho Ming thought, who was often seen by the night staff, though sometimes also during the day. He was generally easy to spot as he looked like and old man in traditional Thai dress, but with a blue aura around his head.
Ghost continue to plague the airport and soon after it was opened a major failure in the baggage handling system was blamed on interference by evil spirits. Supernatural involvement was also suspected in the deaths of 2 employees in separate accidents close to the terminal.
The general unease increased when a number of Thai and international visitors committed suicide by jumping off the terminals 4th floor level to the car park below.
So the airport authorities supplemented the shrines by adding a number of “ghost houses” round the airport. These are small ornate constructions which look almost like a dollhouse and are placed on pedestals close to the building to be protected. They are always kept immaculately clean and well supplied with food and drink.
The idea is that the ghost house will be so attractive to any wondering spirit that they will choose to live there rather than enter the airport and bother the living.
They were still having unexplained issues such as an aircraft undercarriage collapsing. Fortunately no one was injured. So they did another ceremony of appeasement, but it was suggested that with the sheer number of ghosts the houses were not attractive any longer. Their answer to that was to build a giant ghost condominium to provide adequate accommodations for all the spirits that haunt the airport.
They still have very regular sightings at the airport, such as sightings of a woman in traditional Thia dress who disappears when approached, ghostly footsteps in many corridors and traditional music heard randomly in parts of the airport.
The Stanley Hotel, Colorado
The Stanley Hotel has an unusual distinction that it not only terrified the horror writer Stephen King, it also inspired him to write one of his most popular novels.
Stephen and his wife stayed at the hotel in September 1974. They were the only guests as the hotel was shutting down for the winter. That night he had a nightmare that is 3 years old son was being chased through the corridors by a strange entity. He woke up and wrote down some notes which would later become the plot for the Shinning.
The hotel was completed in 1909 and was one of the first hotels in this part of America to have electric lights as the hotel had it’s own hydro-electric plant to supply the 140 gust rooms. The hotel immediately proved popular, but several of the guest rooms have a reputation for being haunted.
Room 428 is haunted by a man in cowboy dress. A couple woke to finding the ghost pacing back and forth at the foot of the bed, but he left when they asked him to leave. Female guests reported to wake with the cowboy ghost leaning over then, seemingly about to place a kiss on their head.
Room 418 is said to be haunted by young children who can be heard giggling, talking and running by the guests in that room, and it is also know as the room where there are indentations in the bed, as if someone has been lying on it, even when there has been no one in the room. Some guests have also reported having the blankets pulled off the bed and the bathroom light switching on and off.
Room 401 is also said to be haunted, though this time by the person who sold the land which the hotel was built. Thomas Wyndham-Quin the 4th Earl of Dunraven and Mount-Earl, though he was never a guest when he was alive, but a shadowy figure has been seen in this room on several occasions. It is presumed to be him buy the smell of the pipe tobacco he was fond of.
The women gust feel very welcome often feeling an arm around their shoulders or their hair being stroked. However the men feel an oppressive atmosphere in this room.
The concert hall in the hotel is also reported to be haunted. Sometimes a piano can be heard when the hall is empty. It is speculated to be Flora Stanley, the wife of the man who had the hotel built, who enjoys picking out music on one of the pianos in the concert Hall.
A young ghost named Lucy is also seen in the Concert Hall who likes to flick the lights on and off and hums.
But the most haunted room is 217 which Stephen king spent the night. It is reported that items are moved around, light turning on and off and even luggage being carefully unpacked and put on the bed.
These reports are reported to be linked to an explosion that happened on June 25th 1911. But there is confusion about what happened.
The Denver times and Denver post reported that a maid Elizabeth Lambert was killed when se inadvertently ignited leaking gas in the room. The Collins weekly Courier agreed that a maid was killed but confidently named her Lizzy Leitenbergher.
However the Colorado Springs Gazette and the Rocky Mountain reported the same story noting the maid was Elizabeth Wilson who survived with 2 broken ankles. What is certain is something did happen in room 217 in 1911 and it now seems to be the focus of a number of paranormal events.
The Stanley Hotel was one of the first to recognize that having haunted rooms doesn’t discourage gusts from visiting, quite the reverse. The hotel now organizes Ghost tours, taking guests to the most haunted rooms and explain the history. It also welcomes investigators form a number of popular ghost hunting TV shows such as ghost Hunters and ghost Adventures.
Next episode more paranormal.
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