Where’s the Pole? – Old Fire Station, Ramsgate

Passing the sign for the River Wantsum on the Thanet Way always makes me smile, as I read it as an invitation for a fight. However the location for tonight’s investigation was home to fighters of a different kind for over 100 years – Ramsgate’s Fire Fighters.

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Before it became the home of Ramsgate’s Fire Brigade in 1905, the fire station was the residence of Rear Admiral William Fox, whose post was addressed to Effingham Lodge, Brick Lane, Ramsgate. Brick Lane became Effingham Place in 1785 before Place was changed to Street between 1849 and 1872.

My sat nav announced that I had reached my destination as I pulled into the yard of what is now Radford House. After scoffing a meal deal I had some time to take some external pictures of the station before I was joined by the rest of the crew from Ghost Hunter Tours (GHT).

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With the night watch reporting all present and correct we commenced our pre tour of this location. The first comment “Where’s the pole? I was expecting a fireman’s pole,” was met with a laugh that echoed around the ground floor room, with electronic rolling doors that once permitted access to the fire engines.

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This space, we were informed, back in Admiral Fox’s day was originally 4 rooms with the dividing walls taken down and the four ornate fireplaces boarded over to create an operational space for what was originally horse drawn fire pumps to be deployed from. Light streamed through the roller doors, which we identified may be an issue in using this space as it was very visible from the street.

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Ascending to the first floor, there were two spaces available, the Dame Janet Room and a Kitchen/toilet area. The Dame Janet room was a basic square, meeting room set up with a 4 tables pushed together and surrounded by chairs – ideal for séance-esq experiments. The Kitchen, was going to be cramped space for the night but provided the option of separating the group and using the dog-leg corridor towards a toilet and shower room.

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Credit:SJP

The top floor provided us with the T.G. Taylor Room, a nice big space with some tables and chairs that we could use. Next door was an office that was not to be accessed by guests, but feeling a bit mischievous decided that this was the best place to set up Drew and Graham, my firefighter dolls, for a locked-off experiment.

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A pole would have been handy to make my way back to the operations floor, but as one could not be located I took the stairs.

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The guests had arrived with whispers of “Where’s the pole?” Clearly there was some minimum expectations of an old fire station, but hopefully this location would not disappoint. This was the second known paranormal investigation of this site, but the first for GHT. The usual welcome and briefing over the guests were divided into three teams, mine remained on the operational floor to commence our investigation in the beating heart of Ramsgate’s Old Fire Station.

The daylight was still present as my group formed a circle around a K2, a multi-meter and cat ball to try and generate some energy to get our night going. I had set up my Plasma Ball on a nearby table, its tentacles searching for a means to earth being the only initial activity on any of the devices.

I took a temperature reading which read 20° and leaving the group to continue to call out starting to take some photographs and video.

Taking a video of the stairwell to the first floor I noticed the tell-tale specks floating at speed.

Orbs are one of the more contentious issues in the paranormal community. Gaining popularity with the move from traditional film cameras to digital imaging the term Orb was first coined by the International Ghost Hunters Society. However a change in recording process and a rise in phenomena reporting must, surely, show some corelation. The way digital photography works is that a light is required to activate a sensor behind the lens, but it is not a simple as that. You have to consider the quality of the sensor, the direction of the light and the components that sit in between.

I take most of my photos and videos on investigation through my Iphone, which if you notice some of the light anomalies that I have discovered are usually a green hue. This is because of the materials and processes used to make the sensor in this camera. Other devices will produce different colours, so this is useful to note.

So taking the above video, taken with only natural light coming from behind me through the shutters of the fire station doors, the ‘orb’ structures that are visible could have several explanations. They could be paranormal but on the other hand they could just be dust particles reflecting the light.

Dust, bugs, pollen, lens flare, over exposure, prolonged exposure are all natural explanations that could create this type of phenomena, throw in pareidolia and you delve into a deep rabbit hole, that is too deep for this blog post.

A second video, taken a short while later, this time with natural light from behind and from in front of the lens shows an ‘orb’ appear from the right and change direction heading towards the camera just above the plasma ball. I will let you draw your own conclusion on this one.   

Finishing my stint as David Bailey an Alice Box app was fired up and the group opened a spirit board. I continued to watch the plasma ball, which appeared to have quite a lot of interaction. The tentacles appearing to find points to earth and slither their way around the inside of the glass ball. The word “Scientist” came through the Alice box.

Pulling myself away from the dancing ball I crossed the concrete floor and went to sit down to observe the spirit board. “Sat” said the box as my backside hit the seat. The board was not doing anything much. The glass being used remained still. Thinking a change would help, I swapped out the glass for a wooden planchette.

Almost immediately the planchette slid across the smooth surface towards a particular guest, and was reluctant to move from this position. Asking to spell a name A-M-P-Y was spelled out. Ampy indicated he was 7 years old, that he liked this particular guest very much, as she remined him of his mother. A-P-O-M came next, asking if the spirit meant Atom, the planchette moved quickly to ‘yes’.

Ampy was an excited spirit, he loved interacting with the plasma ball, as he referred to it as atom, he was a good boy and was with 3 other spirits on the operations floor. Reports of a decrease in temperature saw a check show a reading of 19.9°, a drop of 0.1° was not conclusive as the sun had now set.

The Rem-pod began to flash, the board spelled out A-M-Y; Ampy’s mother’s name and activity began to dwindle. Closing the board we commenced an Estes Session, and conversation with Ampy continued.

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As soon as the sitter was blindfolded and plugged in came the word “Hi.” “Is that Ampy?” a guest asked, the sitter replied “Yes”. Ampy reiterated that he was looking for his mother, Amy, but he was happy where he was. I sat down on the second step of the staircase to the first floor and the sitter stated “two steps.” I noticed that Ampy had good observational skills and challenged him to a game, asking him to activate the motion sensor music box that had remained silent all evening. The sitter responded “I’m gonna do it” and acknowledged the instruction to walk in front of it by saying “alright then.” The group were offering supportive and encouraging words, but as our session came to a close the box remained silent. The excuse provided by the sitter – “She doesn’t want me to come to her corner.”

During the review stage after the investigation, I though locating an Ampy may have been an easy task. Unfortunately I could find no record of any Ampys or Amys linked to the building in any of its iterations. The question still remains of who was in the corner and why she would not let Alby come in.

Swapping groups we filed into the Dame Janet room and took our seats around the table. Setting up the plasma ball, with a carefully placed K2 to prevent mis readings from the plasma, the group started to call out. The attention was soon focused on the tentacles in the middle of the table, which began to move as if being manipulated by something unseen.

 In order to test the function of the ball I reached out and placed my fingers on the glass. The purple/blue tentacles shot out to meet my fingertips, as I felt a firm, deliberate pressure on my back keeping me in the stress position that I found myself in. Feeling like it lasted a lot longer than it probably did in actuality the pressure eventually released allowing me to sit up properly, removing my hand from the ball.

The others sat around the table tried the same, tentatively placing fingers on the plasma ball, but none reported the same pushing or level of force that I had experienced. Suddenly the cat ball to my right burst in to life, well a partial life as only the red and yellow LED’s were flashing with a distinct lack of blue light. Coincidence bearing in mind that we were in a fire station? Perhaps but when the ball was checked at the end of the session it quite happily flashed with all three colours again. An interesting cat ball issue or spirit ability to influence a particular colour on the device?

Playing with balls had taken us to the halfway mark of our time in this space and having been sat down for a bit we decided to stretch our legs and head down to the kitchen area.

The natural separation created by the dog-leg corridor to a toilet made this space idea for an Estes session. So finding a willing volunteer to act as sitter we set up a chair outside the toilet whilst the rest of the group found a comfortable perch in the kitchen.

The usual starting questions; “Is there anybody there?” “Do you want to talk to us?” started this session. Although no response from the sitter a cat ball that had been placed in in front of them started to flash. “Are you male?” gained an “Mmmm” from the sitter with the follow up question “Old or young?” being responded to with “I know. Old.” The questionable response to the age being 1 was received but we went on to understand that there were 4 other spirits as well as 5-6 children in this already cramped space.

“Help, Help!” came from the sitter and as I went to ask questions I felt a tightening within my throat, as if something was blocking my airway. This caused a bout of coughing, to which the sitter stated “Cough, Cough” almost mockingly. Catching my breath I clarified the comment “Did you mean Fuck off?” I was told “No, No.”

The sitter reported that something was touching her hair, and when questioned if the spirit communicated was touching her “Yep” came the reply. The spirit was asked if they liked hanging around the toilet to which the reply this time was a definite “Fuck off!” followed by a word that sounded like ‘Ship’. As we bought the sitter out of her sensory deprivation I asked what the final word she had said was as it sounded like ‘Chit’. She confirmed the word – Shit.

The second and third sitters had no replies to any of the questions asked. However when asked if the spirit could turn the tap on in the bathroom during the final sitters session, a boiler situated in a cupboard suddenly kicked in with that distinctive sound of heating water. Coincidence? Possible, but boilers usually work on timers or temperature sensors. So hardly conclusive.

What was interesting was the sound of the door handle on the toilet turning and snapping back on its spring. The sitter reported hearing the sound over the noise cancelling headphones. The rest of the group reported hearing the same sound, so a shared experience. Checking the door, the sprung bolt had been rendered useless by years of gloss paint gluing the mechanism. Turning the handle, however, provided the same sound that had been heard.

A very interesting end to an interesting session on the first floor, with activity and communication provided by most of the equipment and experiments deployed.

A well needed break followed where one of the guests was describing entering the room on the top floor to discover chairs had been oddly stacked. Comparing photos with my pre-investigation ones and indeed chairs that had been folded and stacked neatly against a wall had been unfolded and stacked at odd angles. A little investigation uncovered this feat was completed by living hands rather than spectral means.

The paper cups properly placed in the recycling signified the start of the third and final session. Calling for my group we went to the top of the building to investigate the T.G Taylor room.

Starting out with a deployment of K2, motion sensor lights, a laser grid and a bell the group settled down, some stood others sat leaning against the walls to get a feel for this space. Once home to the station bar, the clean white paint on the plasterboard now hiding the history of this space.

Opening an Estes Session, the sitter sat in silence as the buzz of scanned frequencies entered his ears. Guests started reporting that they felt uncomfortable within this room, a Necromany App broke the silence with the robotic male voice “My life was taken.” The group then asked if Neil Fogg had followed them upstairs.

This group had encountered Neil during a spirit board session on the operations floor. Spelling out his name Neil Fogg said that he was an 11 year old boy, born in 1956 and attended a school near to the fire station. His short life was ended here in 1967 by a male called Peter, but Neil enjoyed being at this location.  Research could find no murders committed at or near to the fire station that matched any of the details provided by Neil.

The sitter, still suspended in sensory depravation had remained silent and so the headphones were handed over like a relay baton to the next willing volunteer. As the new sitter got comfortable “I can use this” was stated and the motion activated strip light was illuminated. A series of deliberate movements around the light demonstrated that the illumination was not caused by anything visible in the room.

“I lost my hair” came from the sitter, apt if you were to describe him and a ripple of laughter spread around the room. The sitter reported hearing laughter in his ears coming through from the spirit box. The sitter fell silent for a while, as did the group, fatigue begging to set in after such a busy investigation for all groups.

“Run!” the sitter broke the silence. “Run!” the sitter repeated louder and with a greater sense of urgency. Questioning why we should run, asking what was coming was the group’s immediate reaction – no one was scooby-doo-ing it out of the room, down the stairs and out into the dark night that had fallen on Ramsgate. 

What we did do was move a motion activated music box outside of the door, its sensor pointing to the top of stairs. The door ingeniously propped open with application of a K2 so that a weather-eye could be kept into the gloom outside to discount any physical body setting it off.

“Run” was repeated again, but this time it was set to the haunting soundtrack of the plinky-plonky music of the box. Silence fell across the room, and then the corridor outside. Someone asking for the music box to activate again had their wish granted. “Run” came again.

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One of the group not listening to the advice to run, decided to stand in the laser grid. He reported feeling that his arms were being raised against his will. This coincided with a significant power drain of the laser, leaving a dull green curtain of dots. Taking the opportunity I took the multi-meter to see what the readings were in this situation.

Pointing the sensor end at the guests chest as you can see from the video provided a 25 reading on the voltmeter, this reading as moved away rapidly decreased before returning to 0. Setting up a red laser grid at the other end of the room, as the green had completely died. The guest moved to the opposite end. The voltage spiked hitting over 50 and then seemed to go mad, with readings topping 230-240.

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Now its always good when dealing with electricity that you have an electrician on hand, and one of the guests was just that. Trying the multi-meter against light switches, cables and emergency lights the meter produced the correct and anticipate readings. So what was causing the voltage spike on the guest? We formed a circle and tested each guest, some had low readings but three in particular had readings above 90 that shot into the red.

The interesting thing was that if I touched them the voltage reading returned to zero.

This experiment turned into guests holding hands, the voltage reading levelling out with those in the chain until I touched any one on the chain and the reading would fall to zero.

Explanation – I cannot locate one. The readings are significantly too high to be natural electricity generated by the human body, as well as having a massive varying fluctuation. There was a resolute zero milligauss recorded demonstrating that there was no electromagnetic field detected. So why or how was all this electric energy being earthed through me. We were three stories up, I was wearing boots with rubber soles and this phenomenon continued I could find no explanation.

Not wanting to finish chasing the voltage as every finding became more and more interesting, being told that we were out of time was a disappointment.

So finishing packing up, I went to check on Drew and Graham and see if anything had wanted to play with them as much as they had wanted to paly with us. As you can see, another locked off experiment with no discernible movement.

Before Credit:SJP

After Credit:SJP

Ramsgate’s Old Fire Station provided highs and lows. The positives being interesting connections through spirit boards and Estes sessions, stories to investigate, strange electrical phenomena and lights and music boxes activating with no visible source. The lows being a negative result from the dolls, a lack of recorded, researchable record of those that we have engaged with and of course there being no fireman’s pole in the station.    

Credit:SJP

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