We are all used to stories about ghosts that begin to appear after some tragedy: a jilted bride who appears in her wedding dress, although she jumped out of a window 100 years earlier; or a murder victim who is trying to report her attacker 30 years after the crime was committed.
But what about events that affected hundreds, if not thousands of people, some of whom survived? About disasters that people around the world often witness? Here is a collection of paranormal phenomena that have been reported in connection with similar tragic incidents.
10. "Ghost Passengers" in Japan
The Great East Japan Earthquake occurred in 2011 and killed more than 16,000 people. For a number of years since the earthquake, taxi drivers in some of the hardest-hit cities, particularly Ishinomaki, have reported encountering “ghost passengers.” Yuka Kudo, a sociology student at Tohuko Gakuin University, surveyed more than 100 drivers as part of research for her thesis. All drivers interviewed believed that they were putting a real person in the car. They turned on the counter, and some even noted the landing time in a log.
One of the drivers interviewed claimed that a few months after the accident, he put a young woman in his car who asked to be driven to the Minamihama area. The taxi driver explained to her that there was nothing left there. Then the passenger asked: “So I died?” When the driver turned to look at her, the woman disappeared.
9. "Ghost Passengers" in Thailand 
“Ghost passengers” are not only appearing in Japan. Following the tsunami caused by the Indian Ocean earthquake on December 26, 2004, residents along the Andaman Sea coast in Thailand began to report that some of the 230,000 dead were among them.
Minibus driver Lek said that two weeks after the tragedy, seven foreign tourists climbed into his van and asked to take them to Kata Beach for 200 baht. But after some time on the road, Lek felt that his body was going numb, and when he looked back, he found himself alone in the car. But unlike the Japanese taxi drivers who felt no fear, Lek states, “I can’t forget it. I'm going to change jobs. I have a daughter, and she can support me, but I’m so scared that I can’t even go out in the evening.”
Wandering ghosts also scare other local residents. A hotel security guard with many casualties left his post shortly after hearing the screams of a female guest who was presumed dead.
Another family living in Khao Lak said that their phone was constantly ringing, but when they picked up the phone, they heard the cries of their dead relatives begging for salvation.
8. Premonition of the sinking of the Titanic 
There are many articles that the terrible fate of the Titanic was predicted in numerous fiction novels - while pointing out the coincidence of many details in the description of the ships and the details of their voyage. But not many people know that the captain of the liner, Edward J. Smith, also seemed to have a presentiment that not everything would go smoothly during the first voyage across the Atlantic.
A collection of his letters, which was sold in 2016, lamented that he was no longer in command of the Cymric but had been appointed captain of the Titanic. More ominous is his letter to his sister, written just two days before the liner hit the iceberg. In the letter he writes: “I still don’t like this ship... I have a strange feeling.”
Captain Smith was a very experienced seaman who had previously served on the sister liner Olympic at the time of its collision with the cruiser Hawk, but at the time he had no special feelings for this particular vessel. Why was he so worried about the ship he had just set foot on board?
Whatever the reason for this, the captain continues to be admired to this day. Many legends have surrounded his name, including the story of Second Officer Leonard Bishop of the USS Winterhaven, who gave a tour of his ship to some of its passengers in 1977. One of the passengers was a quiet, attentive man who spoke with a British accent. Bishop sensed that there was something strange about the man, but he couldn't quite put his finger on what it was. A few years later he came across a portrait of a ship's captain and exclaimed, “I know this man. I gave him a tour of my ship." The man in the photograph was Captain Edward J. Smith.
7. Ghost of the Somme 
By the end of the Battle of the Somme, which had lasted four and a half months, more than a million people had been killed or wounded. Most likely, you expect that we will now talk about the ghost of someone who fell in battle, but we will talk about someone whose foot never set foot on the battlefield.
On the morning of November 5, 1916, thirteen days before one of the bloodiest battles of the First World War ended, English soldiers of the 2nd Battalion Suffolk Regiment witnessed something inexplicable. As Captain W.E. wrote in August 1919. Newcombe in an issue of Pearson's Magazine, German troops had already begun firing into their trenches, but that was not what attracted everyone's attention. The captain described how he personally witnessed a "brilliant white light" that seemed to rise from a muddy strip between two trenches, called "no man's land." Further, according to his story, the cloud of light transformed into the figure of a man in an outdated military uniform.
The man was quickly identified as Lord Kitchener, whose face appeared on thousands of British army posters. The image pointed directly at the viewer and was accompanied by the caption: “Your country needs you.” Lord Kitchener died in June of that year, a month before the Battle of the Somme began.
The British ceased fire, but the figure did not disappear, it continued to walk parallel to the trenches in such a way as if the lord was inspecting his troops. He then turned his face to the German side, from which they also saw the ghost, and the Germans ceased fire, trying to understand what they were seeing. However, the British artillerymen, who were located at a distance from the trenches, noticing the light, decided that their help was needed and opened fire on the German troops, who again began to storm the defensive lines. During this chaos, the figure returned to where it came from.
6. Baggage Finders 
People living near O'Hare International Airport in Chicago have often reported strange visitors appearing in their homes. They knock on the door and explain that they need to “make contact” or “find their luggage,” but first, Before the homeowners can find out more, the man disappears.
On the highway nearby, motorists often notice strange lights and strange figures wandering along the road. If you spend any time on the airport grounds, you may feel a sudden drop in temperature, accompanied by screams from a nearby field.
These phenomena are associated with the disaster that occurred in May 1979. Then American Airlines DC-10 Flight 191 crashed shortly after takeoff due to the failure of one of its engines. The plane with full fuel tanks instantly turned into a fireball. All 271 people on board and two people on the ground were killed. Paranormal sightings continue to this day, and if you're brave enough, you can take advantage of a local ghost tour company. To do this, you need to spend the night in a camp near the airport.
5. Joplin's Butterfly People 
There are many stories about Joplin's butterfly people, and they are all very similar. When a tornado unexpectedly struck the city on May 22, 2011, many children were outside with their parents or grandparents. They didn't have time to find shelter. When the tornado began lifting cars and collapsing buildings, the adults decided they were doomed to die. However, by some miracle the storm ended and they remained unharmed. After the tornado, some children began asking questions: “Did you see how cute they were?” "Who was pretty?" – the adults were surprised. “Haven’t you seen butterfly people?”
Soon the story of the butterfly people protecting people from tornadoes spread throughout the city. They were talked about on the streets and in church sermons. Children who received medical consultations regarding their injuries began to claim that they, too, saw these angelic beings and that it was they who saved and comforted them during the disaster. When a mural was unveiled in downtown Joplin to commemorate what the city experienced, the paintings featured large, colorful butterflies. Although the project's artistic director, Dave Lowenstein, is keen to emphasize that butterflies have many symbolic meanings, residents of the city associate the images with the supernatural experiences of the townspeople. “There are even butterflies on the fresco,” says one of the residents, “because everyone has heard about the butterfly people.”
4. Ghost in the Subway 
When the Underground was first built in London in the mid-19th century, some people expressed very serious concerns that tunneling deep into the Earth would anger the devil. In addition, many lines and stations were built on ancient burial sites, such as Aldgate station. It is believed that 4,000 people died from the plague in this place.
In 2005, archaeological excavations uncovered 238 burials around Aldgate station believed to be the result of the plague. Many bodies were damaged during the construction of the subway. Unexplained phenomena occur so frequently at Aldgate station that many cases are recorded in work logs.
The most famous story is about a station worker who slipped and fell on a contact rail, causing 20,000 volts to pass through his body. He somehow survived, but his colleagues report that the moment before he touched the rail, the ghost of an old woman appeared nearby, knelt down and stroked the worker's hair.
However, some episodes are associated with later tragedies. In 1943, residents of Bethnal Green in east London heard the sound of an airborne siren. As a result of the ensuing panic, when people tried to take refuge in the subway, 173 people, mostly women and children, were trampled to death. Even worse, the anxiety turned out to be educational. Since then, night workers have reported hearing women and children screaming. One worker was so frightened that he ran out of the station, trying to escape the ghostly sounds.
On November 18, 1987, a fire occurred at King's Cross station. The culprit of the fire was a passenger who, having lit a cigarette on the escalator, threw a burning match. The match ignited the oil-soaked wooden steps of the escalator, and after 15 minutes the flames reached the ticket hall and burst into it like a ball of fire. Thirty-one people died. Since then, many passengers have reported seeing a modern and elegantly dressed young woman with brown hair raising her arms and shouting. When someone approaches her to help, she disappears. Many speculate that this is one of the victims of the King Cross Station fire.
3. Nurse at the 9/11 disaster site 
It is understandable that the scale of the September 11 terrorist attack led to many people reporting ghosts during and after the attack. Many survivors claim that they were saved by an invisible force. One such witness stated that she led him through a wall of fire and led him to the stairs in the North Tower. Another survivor who was trapped in concrete slabs describes being visited by a comforting ghost dressed as a monk.
There were also more unusual phenomena that were observed by more than one person. One such witness was NYPD officer Frank Marra, who helped clear the rubble after the attack. He reported seeing a woman dressed in a World War II Red Cross uniform carrying a tray of sandwiches. He states that he believed she was a first aid provider and that he saw her on more than one occasion. She was about 50 meters away, and he had no doubt that she was a living person. Fear gripped him later, by which time he had already retired from police service a year ago. Marra had long forgotten about the strange woman when one of the detectives asked him if he had heard stories about “the ghost of a Red Cross nurse who tried to distribute sandwiches and coffee to the victims.” It was then that Marra realized that he was not the only one who had noticed this mysterious figure. And since there were no people who would claim to know her, she remained a mystery.
2. Loft and Repo 
On December 29, 1972, at approximately 11:42 a.m., Eastern Airlines Flight 401 crashed into Everglades National Park in Florida. Shortly before the crash, the crew noticed that the landing gear indicator light had stopped working, but although they were concerned, no one noticed that the autopilot had turned off and the plane was slowly losing altitude. By the time they noticed it, it was already too late. 75 people survived, 101 died.
Among the dead were Captain Bob Loft and flight engineer Don Repo. It was these two people who soon began to appear on other Eastern Airlines planes, in particular on those that were equipped with spare parts taken from the wreckage of the crashed plane. Many of the appearances were witnessed by more than one witness, including the time the crew chief and two flight attendants not only saw but also spoke with the late Captain Loft before he disappeared. They were so shocked that they canceled the flight. Even the vice president of Eastern Airlines reported a conversation with a man whom he considered to be the crew commander and about whom he only later realized that it was the recently deceased Loft.
As for flight engineer Repo, it seems that his ghost is seriously concerned about the proper preparation of the planes for the flight. One flight engineer going through the pre-flight check stated that Repo appeared and said, "You don't need to worry about the pre-flight check, I've already done it." One of the flight attendants saw Repo fixing the microwave, another saw his face in the oven. When she called two colleagues, all three heard Repo say, “Watch the fire on that plane.” Interestingly, the plane later developed engine problems, and the last leg of the flight was cancelled. Another time, Repo appeared before the crew commander and told him: “There will never be any more crashes. We will not allow this to happen." This statement led some to believe that the ghostly appearances were an attempt to make amends.
1. Revived dead man 
When Sorpong Pyu was seventeen years old, he witnessed his father Nam, a Cambodian government official, being bundled into a blue truck and driven away. This happened during the dark period between 1975 and 1979, during which the Khmer Rouge under Pol Pot killed an estimated 1.7 million people. To date, 309 mass graves with approximately 19,000 graves have been discovered. It is therefore understandable that when Nam did not return, Sorpong began to assume that his father was one of the victims.
Sorpong and his family were among the lucky ones. After spending time in a refugee camp in Thailand in 1982, Sorpong, his mother and six siblings moved to Canada. There Sorpong continued his distinguished academic career. In January 2010, while Sorpong was in Tokyo, he had a vivid dream in which he was walking and talking with his father. Although it was only a dream, Sorpong realized how much he still missed his father. Unknown to him, one of his brothers was planning to visit a psychic woman in Ottawa, wanting advice on his business. During the session, she asked her brother where his father was and whether he saw him. The brother replied that he saw his father taken away when he was five years old and that he was killed. But the psychic told him that this is not so, Nam is still alive.
Doubting the psychic's words, but still intrigued, Sorpong's brother informed the rest of the family about everything. This led their skeptical sister to approach the same woman without giving her name. The psychic told her the same thing: her father is alive. When her mother went to see her, she received the same answer. The result was two trips by one of Sorpong's brothers to Cambodia to see if he could find the man they believed had been killed nearly thirty years earlier. He distributed hundreds of photographs of Nam taken four decades ago. He visited Thai border towns and former refugee camp sites. He was eventually directed to a man who said the photo on the flyer looked like him when he was young, but he refused to believe that the Canadian could be one of his sons. His son also had doubts, but they gradually began to dissipate when Nam Pyu began to tell family stories that only the father could know. It seemed that father and son had found each other.
But how did Namu manage to escape? He was actually taken into a truck, and they threw him into a ditch and piled bodies on top of him. Somehow he survived, only to be beaten and tortured. He managed to escape into the jungle and cross the Thai-Cambodian border. We believed that his family was less fortunate and that they died. After that, he married and had six more children. But his first wife, Sorpong's mother, heard that her 85-year-old husband was alive and returned to Cambodia to be near him and his new family. Soon followed by one of their sons, the mother and son opened a seafood restaurant and now take care of everyone else. Finally, Sorpong himself returned to the country and was reunited with his father, whom he had not seen for 36 years.
"Taos Noise"
Have you heard the engine or drilling rig running? It is this kind of unpleasant noise that disturbs the peace of residents of the American city of Taos. An incomprehensible humming sound coming from the direction of the desert first appeared almost 18 years ago, and since then it has reappeared regularly. When city residents turned to the authorities with a request to conduct an investigation, it turned out that the noise seemed to come from the bowels of the earth, it could not be registered by location devices, and only 2% of the city population heard it. A similar phenomenon is observed in other regions of the planet. It occurs especially often in Europe. As in the case of the Taoist rumble, the reasons for its occurrence and source have not yet been discovered.
Ghostly doppelgängers
Cases when people meet their doubles are not uncommon. Stories about dopplegangers (this is to avoid writing “doubles” twice in a row) are present both in medical practice, which is not at all surprising, and in historical documents and literary works. Guy de Maupassant told his friends about meeting his double. The mathematician Descartes, the French writer George Sand, the English poets and writers Shelley, Byron, and Walter Scott also encountered their copies. We won’t even mention Dostoevsky’s story “The Double.”
However, doppelgängers also visit people of prosaic professions. Here are the stories collected by Dr. Edward Podolsky. One woman saw her double while putting on makeup in front of the mirror. A man working in the garden noticed next to him an exact copy of himself, repeating all his movements.
Scientists suggest that the secret of doppelgängers may be hidden in our brains. By processing information, our nervous system creates a so-called spatial diagram of the body, which, for reasons unknown to science, is divided into real and astral images. Alas, this is just a hypothesis.
Life after death
A light at the end of a dark tunnel, an unusual luminous creature, a calling voice, the ghosts of deceased loved ones - this is what awaits a person in the next world, according to the words of the “resurrected”. In other words, they suffered clinical death.
One of the proofs of the reality of the afterlife was the research of William James, which he conducted with the participation of the medium Leonora Piper. For about ten years, the doctor organized spiritualistic seances, during which Leonora spoke on behalf of the Indian girl Chlorin, then Commander Vanderbilt, then Longfellow, then Johann Sebastian Bach, then the actress Siddons. The doctor invited spectators to his sessions: journalists, scientists, and other mediums so that they could confirm that communication with the world of the dead actually occurs.
Unfortunately, there are no scientific facts on this matter yet. However, maybe this is for the better?
Noisy Spirit
Poltergeists are an inexplicable phenomenon and at the same time a constant hero of yellow press materials. “Barabashka stole the family’s salary from Kapotnya and wrote a swear word on the wall,” “Poltergeist became the father of three children,” these and similar headlines still regularly attract an audience.
Poltergeists were first mentioned almost two thousand years ago by the historian Titus Livius, who described how someone invisible threw stones at Roman soldiers. After this, cases of poltergeist appearances were described many more times. Mentions of this phenomenon are even present in the chronicles of a French monastery. According to the chronicler, on September 16, 1612, something incredible happened in the house of the Huguenot priest François Perrault. It all started when, at midnight, the curtains began to close on their own, and someone was pulling the bed linen off the beds. Loud noises were heard from various parts of the house, and someone was throwing dishes in the kitchen. The poltergeist not only methodically destroyed the house, but also cursed desperately. The Church decided that the devil had taken up residence in the house of a Huguenot sinner, and Martin Luther later proposed calling the “obscene spirit” a poltergeist. After 375 years in the USSR they will call him the drummer.
Heavenly signs
According to history, clouds are not only white-maned horses. Since time immemorial, eyewitness accounts have been preserved telling about whole pictures, meaningful signs and numbers that suddenly appeared in the sky. According to legend, one of these heavenly visions predicted victory for Julius Caesar, and another - a blood-red flag with a white cross - gave strength to the retreating Danish troops and helped them defeat the pagan Estonians.
Scientists are skeptical about such pictures in the sky and name several reasons for their appearance. Today, various figures in the sky can form aircraft exhaust. After aircraft fuel burns out, water vapor enters the atmosphere and immediately turns into ice crystals. Caught up in air vortices, they behave very unpredictably and can create various shapes. Aerosols based on carbon dioxide and barium salts sprayed during weather experiments can also cause such phenomena. In addition, air, due to its specific properties, sometimes acquires the ability to reflect what is happening on Earth.
The phenomenon of wandering graves
In 1928, all Scottish newspapers were full of news about a grave that had disappeared from the cemetery of the small town of Glenysville. Relatives who came to visit the deceased found an empty space instead of a stone tombstone. It was never possible to find the grave.
In 1989, on a Kansas farm, a grave mound with a lopsided and cracked headstone appeared overnight right in the middle of a barnyard. Due to the poor condition of the slab, it was impossible to read the name on it. But when the grave was excavated, a coffin with human remains was found in it.
All this devilry is considered commonplace in some African and Polynesian tribes. There is a tradition there of dousing a fresh grave with tree sap and covering it with shells. This is done, according to the priests, so that the grave “does not leave.”
Pyrokinesis
Cases where people engulfed in flames of unknown origin turned into a handful of ashes in just a few minutes have been known for a very long time. Although this phenomenon occurs infrequently: over the entire last century, only 19 cases of pyrokinesis were recorded in the world. Scientists cannot explain why this happens, and most importantly, why the flame often does not spread to surrounding objects.
In 1969, a man was found dead in his car. His face and hands were burned, but for some reason the fire did not touch his hair and eyebrows. A completely fantastic incident occurred in the Canadian province of Alberta. Two sisters flashed at the same instant, being in different parts of the city, a kilometer away from each other.
Versions of the origin of pyrokinesis are increasingly fantastic. Some doctors are trying to link spontaneous combustion of people with their internal state, since it is known that most victims were depressed for a long time. Others believe that it is mainly alcoholics who are affected by pyrokinesis. Their body is so saturated with alcohol that it can burst into flames at the slightest spark, especially if the deceased smoked. There is a version that the flame arises under the influence of either ball lightning that happens to be nearby, or energy beams unknown to science. And recently a completely incredible theory was put forward. Allegedly, the source of energy in a living cell is a thermonuclear reaction, that is, under the influence of an unknown force, inexplicable energy processes begin to occur in the cell, similar to those that occur during the explosion of an atomic bomb.
You will find more secrets and mysteries in the documentary series Fact or Fiction: Paranormal Activity on the Syfy Universal channel. New episodes every Monday at 21.00.
Almost all natural phenomena can be explained using physical laws and mathematical formulas.
However, there are still some places in the world that defy explanation. No matter how hard scientists try, everything is in vain.
Lights of Hessdalen
For decades, locals in Norway's Hessdalen Valley have lived in fear of mysterious lights. Often at night you can see strange lights appearing in the sky, moving chaotically and even flashing different colors.
And this was not just observed by a few residents: the phenomenon was confirmed by qualified researchers. But no one has yet been able to explain these light phenomena.
There were, of course, many theories about this, including the most incredible.
But at least one assumption sounds more or less plausible. This theory is due to the high radioactivity in the area. Radon is believed to be deposited on dust particles, and when that dust escapes into the atmosphere, the radioactive element decays, creating fires like these.
If this is true, then this is bad news for local residents, because it is dangerous.
Some scientists also suggest that the Hessdalen valley resembles a huge mobile phone battery. It was found that one area of the valley is rich in copper deposits, another area is rich in zinc, and these elements are the main composition of batteries.
This creates a certain acidity in the air that can produce sparks in the atmosphere that look like an alien invasion. Also, the river in the valley contains sulfuric acid due to a nearby sulfur mine. One way or another, all this remains only guesswork, but not facts.
Strange epidemic
The small state of Kazakhstan has every chance to become famous throughout the world, but this is not what it is worth being famous for. It's about a mysterious epidemic that is said to cause fatigue, memory loss, hallucinations and long-term bouts of unexpected narcolepsy.
Over the past few years, hundreds of residents of the village of Kalachi (Akmola region) have already reported loss of consciousness. The problem became so serious that the authorities even evacuated the residents of the settlement.
It should be noted that all the blood tests of the people complaining turned out to be normal, which leads to the following thought: the situation is similar to ordinary mass hysteria. Perhaps there are just lazy residents who like to sleep at work.
The main hypothesis of experts is based on the fact that the residents of Kalachi suffer from the consequences of radiation poisoning, since the city is located near a uranium mine. However, there are inconsistencies in this theory: even closer to the uranium mine there is a city in which residents do not complain about a strange epidemic.
The Mystery of Taos Town
If you've ever heard the hum of a television or the whirring of electrical wires, you know that these sounds can drive you crazy. So residents of Taos, New Mexico, USA, hear such sounds all the time.
Since the 1990s, citizens of Taos have reported constant, continuous buzzing noises that can be heard throughout the city, leaving people terrified.
For example, on the island of Borneo, similar sounds come from a local factory. But things aren't that simple in Taos. In this small town, various researchers have been trying to find the source of the unbearable sound for more than 20 years, all without success.
Most of all, scientists adhere to the theory that local residents’ hearing may be too sensitive, which is why they are able to hear any sounds that are barely audible to a common person.
Devil's Cauldron
In the state of Minnesota, USA, there is one phenomenon that scientists have been struggling to solve for many years - this is the so-called Devil's Cauldron.
In this place the Brul River flows over the rocks. Part of the river flows into the lake, and the other part falls into a hole. The mystery is that it is unclear where this pit leads. It seems as if the water is flowing to nowhere.
Of course, there are assumptions that the water enters the underground cave system, but then it must still flow out somewhere, for example, near a lake. The catch is that it is impossible to determine where exactly the water that gets into the Devil's Cauldron flows.
Researchers tried their best to find out: they poured paint into the hole in order to observe where the colored water would end up. When that didn't work, the researchers launched ping pong balls, which also disappeared without a trace into the Devil's Cauldron.
Thus, this place is fraught with an amazing mystery, the answer to which may or may not be somewhere nearby?
Falling birds
Every year at the end of August in the Jatinga Valley, Assam, India, people gather, light bonfires and observe an unusual phenomenon. From early morning until late evening, flocks of birds fly into the sky, but they try to land straight into these hot fires. You can knock them down with a long stick without much difficulty.
This phenomenon was first noticed in 1964. Over time, it was discovered that similar cases were also observed in the Philippines, Malaysia, and the Indian state of Mizoram.
For now, ornithologists prefer to stick to only one conclusion: young migratory birds can be disturbed by strong winds, so they fly into the light in search of salvation or shelter.
Unusual dune
In the Altyn-Emel National Park, Almaty region, Kazakhstan, lies the Singing Dune, 1.5 km long and about 130 m high. The unusual thing about this mound is that in a dry state it can make sounds. These sounds can be like crying, an organ melody, or anything else.
Moreover, the sand from this dune continues to “sing” if it is placed in any container and shaken.
There is a version that grains of sand can sound like this as a result of friction.
Source: cracked.com, Translation: Lisitsyn R.V.
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Very often, phenomena occur in nature that even science cannot explain. Even in ancient times, people considered such phenomena, occurring once every 10 or even 100 years, to be special and worshiped them. So, the most amazing and inexplicable phenomena found in nature:
Colored Moon.
A rare phenomenon that appears as a result of various atmospheric transformations. As a result, the Moon takes on different colors and shades: red, blue, purple, yellow and pink. The Red Moon is also called the “Bloody Moon”. Of all the colors of the Moon, blue is the rarest.Mirage.
Perhaps the most common and often heard phenomenon. It's also mysterious. There are many legends and tales about this phenomenon. Mirages are deceptive illusions of objects or phenomena in nature. Presumably, these illusions are an unusual accumulation of particles and the simultaneous incidence of sunlight at a certain angle. As a result, a person seems to see the sea, buildings, animals, and so on in the distance. Many people believe that mirages appear to travelers mainly in deserts or savannas, but scientists have proven the fact that the colder the climate, the greater the likelihood of a mirage appearing.
Lunar rainbow.
A rare phenomenon generated by the Moon. It has similarities with an ordinary rainbow, the differences being more faded colors and the appearance of a rainbow only at night. Presumably, a lunar rainbow is light reflected from the surface of the Moon. For it to occur, the Moon must be in full phase, low above the horizon, and bright enough.
Halo.
A rare phenomenon similar to a lunar rainbow, representing a kind of ring around the Sun. This ring can be compared to a halo above the head of an angel. A halo, unlike a rainbow, can rotate and change shape and size.
Fire tornado.
A rare natural phenomenon that usually occurs during a large fire. The fire whirlwinds combine into one, forming a tornado, moving at great speed and destroying everything in its path.
Rains of animals.
An extremely rare natural phenomenon. For many years, not a single scientist has been able to explain even the approximate reasons for its occurrence. The essence of the phenomenon lies in the massive precipitation of fish, frogs, spiders, and birds. Presumably, the phenomenon is associated with powerful air masses capable of transporting animals over long distances.
Green beam.
A rare optical phenomenon that occurs at sunrise or sunset. It appears as a green flash on the horizon. Many who see this phenomenon for the first time often confuse it with a UFO.
Ball lightning.
Probably the most unique, rare and inexplicable natural phenomenon is a fireball that can move in the air and even pass through objects (most often sockets). Until now, no reliable information has been revealed about the nature of the occurrence of ball lightning.
Moving stones.
At Racetrack Playa in a place called Death Valley in California, there is an unusual phenomenon of rocks moving on their own. Currently, there is not a single intelligible theory of such a phenomenon, but it is known that the stones moved at a speed of 10 m per year.
No matter how hard scientists tried to observe moving stones, these observations did not bring success; the stones seemed to grow to the ground and did not move.
Stone balls.
Located in Costa Rica. These stones have a perfect round shape, reaching two meters in diameter. Scientists began studying these stones in 1943, and there is still no explanation for the ideal shape of the stones.
Rain jelly.
A rare phenomenon that occurred only 2 times in history. Instead of drops of water, precipitation in the form of jelly is observed. Research has shown that the jelly contains exactly the same substances as human blood, but scientists were unable to explain the phenomenon.
Animals in stone.
There are rare cases of finding animals immured in stone (mostly marine animals: frogs, turtles, crabs, mollusks). What makes these cases even more surprising is the fact that some animals were found alive and healthy after living without air, food or water for a year or more.
All these phenomena cannot but surprise the common man. Perhaps speculation about the existence of other civilizations and worlds is not so meaningless.
Scientists have classified the most unusual and mysterious phenomena on Earth. What our ancestors once called “devilry”, modern scientists classify as the realm of the unknown. However, they cannot yet explain the reason for this most unknown thing.
"Taos Noise"
Have you heard the engine or drilling rig running? It is this kind of unpleasant noise that disturbs the peace of residents of the American city of Taos. An incomprehensible, mysterious humming sound coming from the desert first appeared almost 18 years ago, and since then it has reappeared regularly. When city residents turned to the authorities with a request to conduct an investigation, it turned out that the noise seemed to come from the bowels of the earth, location devices could not register it, and only 2% of the city population heard it. A similar phenomenon is observed in other regions of the planet. It occurs especially often in Europe. As in the case of the Taoist rumble, the reasons for its occurrence and source have not yet been discovered.
Ghostly doppelgängers
Unusual cases where people meet their doubles are not uncommon. Stories about dopplegangers (this is to avoid writing “doubles” twice in a row) are present both in medical practice (which is not at all surprising) and in historical documents and literary works. Guy de Maupassant told his friends about meeting his double. The mathematician Descartes, the French writer George Sand, the English poets and writers Shelley, Byron, and Walter Scott also encountered their copies. We won’t even mention Dostoevsky’s story “The Double.”
However, doppelgängers also visit people of prosaic professions. Here are the stories collected by Dr. Edward Podolsky. One woman saw her double while putting on makeup in front of the mirror. A man working in the garden noticed next to him an exact copy of himself, repeating all his movements.
Scientists suggest that the secret of mysterious doppelgängers may be hidden in the brain. By processing information, our nervous system creates a so-called spatial diagram of the body, which, for reasons unknown to science, is divided into real and astral images. Alas, this is just a hypothesis.
Life after death
A light at the end of a dark tunnel, an unusual luminous creature, a calling voice, the ghosts of deceased loved ones - this is what awaits a person in the next world, according to the “resurrected”. In other words, people who have experienced clinical death.
One of the proofs of the reality of the afterlife was the research of William James, which he conducted with the participation of the medium Leonora Piper. For about ten years, the doctor organized spiritualistic seances, during which Leonora spoke on behalf of the Indian girl Chlorin, then Commander Vanderbilt, then Longfellow, then Johann Sebastian Bach, then the actress Sidsons. The doctor invited spectators to his sessions: journalists, scientists, and other mediums so that they could confirm that communication with the world of the dead actually occurs.
Unfortunately, there are no scientific facts on this matter yet. However, maybe this is for the better?
Noisy Spirit
Poltergeists are an inexplicable mysterious phenomenon and at the same time a constant hero of yellow press materials. “Barabashka stole the family’s salary from Kapotnya and wrote a swear word on the wall,” “Poltergeist became the father of three children,” these and similar headlines still regularly attract an audience.
Poltergeists were first mentioned almost two thousand years ago by the historian Titus Livius, who described how someone invisible threw stones at Roman soldiers. After this unusual occurrence, poltergeist appearances were described many more times. Mentions of this phenomenon are even present in the chronicles of a French monastery. According to the chronicler, on September 16, 1612, something incredible happened in the house of the Huguenot priest François Perrault. It all started when, at midnight, the curtains began to close on their own, and someone was pulling the bed linen off the beds. An unusually loud noise was heard from various parts of the house, and someone was throwing dishes in the kitchen. The poltergeist not only methodically destroyed the house, but also cursed desperately. The Church decided that the devil had taken up residence in the house of a Huguenot sinner, and Martin Luther later proposed calling the “obscene spirit” a poltergeist. After 375 years in the USSR they will call him the drummer.
Heavenly signs
According to history, clouds are not only white-maned horses. Since time immemorial, eyewitness accounts have been preserved telling about whole pictures, meaningful signs and numbers that suddenly appeared in the sky. According to legend, one of these heavenly visions predicted victory for Julius Caesar, and another - a blood-red flag with a white cross - gave strength to the retreating Danish troops and helped them defeat the pagan Estonians.
Scientists are skeptical about such pictures in the sky and name several reasons for their appearance. Today, various figures in the sky can form aircraft exhaust. After aircraft fuel burns out, water vapor enters the atmosphere and immediately turns into ice crystals. Caught up in air vortices, they behave very unpredictably and can create various shapes. Aerosols based on carbon dioxide and barium salts sprayed during weather experiments can also be the cause of such mysterious phenomena. In addition, air, due to its specific properties, sometimes acquires the ability to reflect what is happening on Earth.
The phenomenon of wandering graves
In 1928, all Scottish newspapers were full of news about a grave that had disappeared from the cemetery of the small town of Glenysville. Relatives who came to visit the deceased found an empty space instead of a stone tombstone. It was never possible to find the grave.
In 1989, on a Kansas farm, a grave mound with a lopsided and cracked headstone appeared overnight right in the middle of a barnyard. Due to the poor condition of the slab, it was impossible to read the name on it. But when the grave was excavated, a coffin with human remains was found in it.
All this mysterious devilry is considered commonplace in some African and Polynesian tribes. There is a tradition there of dousing a fresh grave with tree sap and covering it with shells. This is done, according to the priests, so that the grave “does not leave.”
Pyrokinesis
Cases where people engulfed in flames of unknown origin turned into a handful of ashes in just a few minutes have been known for a very long time. Although this phenomenon occurs infrequently: over the entire last century, only 19 cases of pyrokinesis were recorded in the world. Scientists cannot explain why this happens, and most importantly, why the flame often does not spread to surrounding objects.
In 1969, a man was found dead in his car. His face and hands were burned, but for some reason the fire did not touch his hair and eyebrows. A completely fantastic incident occurred in the Canadian province of Alberta. Two sisters flashed at the same instant, being in different parts of the city, a kilometer away from each other.
Versions of the origin of mysterious pyrokinesis are increasingly fantastic. Some doctors are trying to link spontaneous combustion of people with their internal state, since it is known that most victims were depressed for a long time. Others believe that it is mainly alcoholics who are affected by pyrokinesis. Their body is so saturated with alcohol that it can burst into flames at the slightest spark, especially if the deceased smoked. There is a version that the flame arises under the influence of either ball lightning that happens to be nearby, or energy beams unknown to science. And recently a completely incredible theory was put forward. Allegedly, the source of energy in a living cell is a thermonuclear reaction, that is, under the influence of an unknown force, inexplicable energy processes begin to occur in the cell, similar to those that occur during the explosion of an atomic bomb.
Interesting newspaper. The world of the unknown, No. 21 2013