June 2008 Archives

Hi, I'm Joanne Morris

And we are Birmingham Ghosts and Hauntings UK, or BGAH for short.

As the name suggests, we're located in Birmingham and we spend whatever time we might have free, investigating hauntings and ghostly sightings around Brum, the West Midlands and sometimes further afield.

At the moment we have ten investigators involved with BGAH, all of whom have had their own personal experiences with unexplained phenomenon.

I hope you will join me each week as I talk about what BGAH does, how we work, what we hope to achieve, and what we hope for the future regarding paranormal research.

I will also be covering topics such as the highs and lows of being an investigator, the equipment we use, past and present investigations - and interesting historical information about the area.

Well, I guess we should get the boring bit covered first by introducing myself.

I'm the founder of BGAH. I have been interested in the paranormal, particularly ghosts, all my life. This fascination stems from my childhood.

I grew up in Harborne, a leafy suburb of Birmingham. My family and I lived in a Georgian townhouse, not far from the High Street.

It was here that my interest in the paranormal began.

My whole family and unsuspecting visitors witnessed unusual occurrences during the time we lived there, and even now, years later, I cannot find any logical explanation.

This house may well have been haunted.

Strange noises and sightings happened on a fairly regular basis.

But when I finally left that house, I continued to encounter these strange experiences - and my curiosity grew ever deeper.

For a long time I had been looking, without success, for a local paranormal group to join. I eventually decided to set up my own group and was very much surprised by the amount of interest it generated.

Now it has become almost a full-time job. We spend most weekends out on location in pubs, museums, offices, theatres and sometimes people's own homes.

It is fascinating work and we've made many friends along the way.

We have been on many investigations and have seen, and heard, some pretty strange stuff indeed!

Although some of what we encounter can be explained, there is plenty that can't.

Mysterious balls of light, doors opening and closing of their own accord, footsteps in empty corridors, just to name but a few.

Our recording equipment has picked up voices of unknown origin and our locked-off video cameras have recorded strange movement.

Are these paranormal events and if they are is there a common denominator that links them ? We hope to find out.

It is not the aim of BGAH to convince people that the paranormal exists. We simply want to explore the possibility that there is something out there we don't quite understand yet.

We will let people know the results from our research - and they can make their own minds up.

It's time to break down the barriers and search long and hard to determine what exactly is going on. Why do so many individuals witness things they perceive to be paranormal?

We combine psychical and scientific approaches in our work, pushing the boundaries, looking for the answers. Join us on our trip into the unknown.