If you thought “ghostbusters” were just a Hollywood invention — think again.
New England Paranormal Investigators (PI-NE) are a team of nine people, headquartered in Vermont, who will come out and investigate if you call them with concerns about a resident ghost, spirit or apparition.
In one instance, a woman in Vermont lived alone in her home but was experiencing sounds, events (such as a toy being thrown at her feet) and even appearances of apparitions, including a slim person suddenly standing in her hallway. (SEE THE VIDEO at the top of this article for this particular case.)
The homeowner installed cameras to record the unsettling events, then called PI-NE.
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When you watch the video about the case in question — you be the judge of what was going on there.
“Typically, by the time people reach out to us, they are at a desperation level where they want us there as soon as possible to determine what is happening,” Betty Miller, the group’s director, told Fox News Digital in an email.
“Most commonly, we hear the client say, ‘I just want to know if I’m crazy,’ or ‘Is this really happening?’”
Miller has been investigating ghosts since 2008.
PI-NE was formed back in 2004.
People experiencing ghostly events “want someone to verify what they are experiencing and if possible, explore why — or the source,” said Miller.
They fill out a form on PI-NE’s website — and the team will evaluate the case.
Apparitions are few and far between, said Miller, and “even harder” to capture on camera.
“I have experienced one full apparition who stood watch over me while I was in bed,” she said.
“It’s a life-changing experience because it doesn’t make sense to the logical mind. As humans, we find it in our nature to have an explanation for everything — and then this happens.”
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The basic audio recorder is her most used, tool, Miller said.
“There is a never-ending production of new equipment available in the field, and we have a lot, which is fantastic, but it always drives back to the audio recorder.”
With a goal of taking “something that is non-physical” and making it “tangible,” she explained that “when you have a voice responding to you through the audio recorder that you did not hear in real time, you now have something solid that can’t be disputed. And that’s very exciting.”
The team recently added a New Hampshire division, which they are “very excited about,” said Miller.
Team member Jason Engel, who is heading up the New Hampshire branch, shared his experience with apparitions.
Two people see the same ‘apparition’
“While on a private investigation with PI-NE, I experienced an apparition manifest in front of myself and another fellow investigator,” he told Fox News Digital by email.
“We were investigating reports of activity around an old, abandoned sugar shack on a property. After hearing knocks and sounds of someone walking around outside the shack, my fellow investigator and I stepped out of the shack and stood in front of it.”
He said that in one window of the shack, which had no glass panes, “a light began to form, for lack of a better word.”
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Noting it was “faint and very hard to distinguish,” he said it “almost seemed like maybe a trick of the eye at first.”
The light began to intensify, he said, and “come more into focus.”
Then, he said, “slowly the face of what appeared to be a woman with dark hair began to become more discernible, but still fuzzy and not quite formed.”
He added, “I took a step forward and shined my light toward the figure, which instantly vanished.”
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The two investigators decided not to share notes on scene but waited until they were with the rest of the team to discuss.
And when they did, “we both described the exact same thing,” he said.
“Definitely, this was an experience that has stayed with me,” he added.
Engel said there are two types of haunting — “intelligent or residual,” he said.
A residual haunting is one in which “the phenomenon … repeats itself over and over in the same exact way” and does not interact with the people in the environment.
It’s almost like “a recording playing back over and over — only it’s played in our reality, our current time and space,” he said.
A “crisis apparition” is one that died suddenly or unexpectedly — and “they sometimes don’t know that they’re dead.”
“An intelligent haunt is one that interacts with occupants or visitors to the location — and experiences vary and are not necessarily repeated.”
For PI-NE investigator Steve Sicard, there are “many reasons” that a spirit stays around, but some of the most common reasons may be “unfinished business.”
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“They are stuck on earth as a residual spirit repeating the same chores or actions that they did on a regular basis,” Sicard said.
He noted that a “crisis apparition” is one that died suddenly or unexpectedly, and “they sometimes don’t know that they’re dead.”
A team member’s own ghostly experience
Team member Karen Keene began investigating the paranormal in 2009.
“In 2013, I saw what I believe to be a shadow [on] the night my mother-in-law passed away,” she told Fox News Digital in an emailed message.
“I asked him why he was on the sofa — he said ‘Grammy’ wanted him to sit with her on the sofa and they were going to watch their favorite movie.”
“I heard footsteps coming up the stairs and thought it may be my son, who was 13 at the time and sleeping in a chair downstairs, after [he had] shoulder surgery.”
Once she heard footsteps, she saw “a dark figure at the top of the stairs outside the bedroom door.”
She added, “The figure turned and walked down the hall. Knowing every bed was taken with my husband’s family, I jumped up and told my son he couldn’t go to his room.”
She said she received no answer after calling her son’s name, so “I turned on the light and no one was there.”
She continued, “I wasn’t sure if that is what it was, but the next morning my son was not in the chair but [was lying] on his side on the sofa.”
“He was not supposed to sleep like that with a sling on his arm,” she continued.
“I asked him why he was on the sofa — he said ‘Grammy’ wanted him to sit with her on the sofa and they were going to watch their favorite movie.”
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Explaining that her son was “very sad” to realize his grandmother was gone, she said he “didn’t know what to think of what had just happened.”
“I personally never ask, ‘Do you know you’re dead?'”
“The fact he had his experience validated mine that same night,” said Keene. “My mother-in-law came to say her goodbyes.”
Team member Kathy Eastman, who said she has seen apparitions her whole life, added that “spirits are sometimes stuck here.”
“Some spirits have suffered trauma and don’t know they died,” she told Fox News Digital by email. “Some spirits choose to remain here with a loved one, like people that were married for a long time.”
She added, “Some spirits don’t want to cross because of fear of having to pay for the wrong things they have done.”
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PI-NE director Miller said that there are “a plethora of spirits” and many “possible reasons why they stay around.”
Some of those reasons are “not so pleasant,” she said, and can be considered “demonic or never even human.” She said the topic itself is “a rabbit hole to go down.”
“But I can tell you in full confidence, it exists,” she added. “In a case of a traumatic departure from earth, it’s true some may not realize they are dead. I personally never ask, ‘Do you know you’re dead?’”
She called that approach “pretty harsh.”
The PI-NE website, www.pi-ne.org, indicates that the team’s services are free — and that they investigate all types of potentially paranormal events.
Brittany Kasko of Fox News Digital contributed reporting.
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