Strange Electromagnetic Dimensions explores such questions as:

• • Do human beings possess a magnetic .sixth sense. similar to that of homing pigeons?

  • Are artificial electromagnetic fields, such as those emitted by power lines, gradually destroying our health?

  • Can being struck by lightning or suffering a severe electric shock result in the development of psychic abilities?

  • What do scientists make of the fact that ball lightning can pass through walls, enter rooms by squeezing through keyholes, and display seemingly intelligent behavior?

Sometimes natural phenomena have supernatural consequences.

According to Dr. Ransom, that the patients had developed “peculiar static electric power” became apparent when one of the patients crumpled up a piece of paper and attempted to throw it into the wastebasket, only to find that the paper “absolutely refused to leave his hand.”2 From that point on, Dr. Ransom and his staff involved the patients in a series of experiments.

In one type of experiment, a patient would rub his hands together and then touch a sheet of paper, causing the paper to become highly charged. Dr. Ransom claims that the charged piece of paper, when placed on a wall (or other surface), would remain clinging to the wall “for many hours.”3 Also, if the charged piece of paper was brought close to a surveyor’s compass, the needle of the compass would rotate. (Presumably the same effect was achieved by having the patient place his hands in close proximity to the compass.)

Another type of experiment was performed whereby a patient would rub his hands together and then rub the outside of an incandescent bulb. By then placing one of their hands a short distance away from the globe, the metal filament inside, being attracted to their hand, would lean against the inside of the globe and also follow the movement of their hand. Dr. Ransom notes that the experiment resulted in “a good deal of sparking at the base of the filament.”4 A similar type of experiment was performed using a steel tape measure suspended from the ceiling, the patient causing the apparatus to swing back and forth.

Given that botulism results in dry skin, coupled with the fact that static electricity favors dry conditions, it’s logical to suggest that the patients’ bodies became highly charged with static electricity due to these factors alone. Yet Dr. Ransom notes that the patients were able to perform the same amazing feats when in a tub of water as when completely dry and fully clothed. Had this been a mundane case of static build up on the body, being placed in water would have rendered the patients static free. That it didn’t render them static free indicates that the electricity was being generated internally—a point we’ll revisit in a moment.

Dr. Ransom further notes that as the patients recovered from the poisoning they slowly lost their electrified properties. He explains: “The ability to electrify is proportioned to the severity of the disease: as the patient convalesces he gradually loses this power and when quite well loses it altogether.”5

Botulism is a rare but potentially fatal illness that affects the autonomic nervous system (ANS). It is most often caused by eating improperly sterilized canned foods containing the botulinum toxin. The botulinum toxin, which is produced by the soil-dwelling Clostridium botulinum bacteria, is one of the most potent poisons known. When the toxin is ingested through food, it makes its way via the bloodstream to nerve endings in muscles, where it blocks the release of acetylcholine, the neurotransmitter responsible for triggering muscle contraction. An absence of acetylcholine means the muscles cannot contract and so they become paralyzed. (The toxin’s ability to cause muscle paralysis has been exploited for cosmetic purposes; Botox treatments consist of injecting small amounts of the toxin into the facial muscles, causing the muscles to relax and wrinkles to disappear.) In fact, the main reason botulism can be fatal is because it causes paralysis of the respiratory muscles, which in turn can lead to asphyxiation. Other symptoms of botulism include drymouth, headache, dizziness, blurred or double vision, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal cramps.

The fact that botulism disrupts electrochemical processes within the body is perhaps key to understanding the connection between it and Wimshurst disorder. The question naturally arises as to whether Wimshurst disorder is an actual (albeit very rare) symptom of botulism, or if additional factors were responsible for causing the patients at Clinton Prison to become highly charged with static electricity. Is this the only case of its kind in the entire history of medicine, or has it happened to others?

A compelling case of HVS was reported in the Daily Mail newspaper in 2008, under the comical title “Meet Mavis, the super-charged grandmother whose touch BLOWS UP kettles.” The “super-charged grandmother” in question is Mavis Price, a retired community development worker in her mid-60s, from Telford, Shropshire, United Kingdom.

According to Price, her body “seems to build up an unusual amount of static [electricity].”6 Because of this, she says, electrical appliances and gadgets of all kinds, including kettles, irons, printers, vacuum cleaners, and computers, have a tendency to malfunction when she touches or stands near them. If fact, so destructive is her influence on electrical devices that she’s continually replacing the ones in her home. Price claims that it’s not uncommon for televisions to “crackle” as she walks past them, and that sometimes people who touch her—or merely stand near her—either receive a powerful static shock or experience their hair standing on end.

Like many afflicted with HVS, Price goes through periods during which her destructive influence on electrical equipment is particularly acute. She explained: “I had a really bad day last week where I got up, turned the light on, and managed to blow the fuse. Then I went to the supermarket and broke the checkout. They had to close the checkout down and said nothing like it had ever happened before. Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse I went to get some photographs printed and managed to completely freeze the whole machine.”7

Understandably, Price’s condition has made her life a challenge in some respects. For example, at one time she set out to complete an IT training course, yet “every time [I] touched the computer it would either freeze or shut down. The technician had to constantly come over to my machine to see what was wrong and he was completely baffled.”8 The course became such a “nightmare” that she ended up not completing it.

Significantly, Price traces the beginning of her strange relationship with electrical equipment to a childhood incident whereby she suffered a severe electric shock while attempting to plug in a television set.

An article published in the New Straits Times, dated June 8, 1985, reports an interesting case of HVS involving a 28-year-old mother of four from Stockport, Manchester, United Kingdom, named Jacqueline Priestman. In the article, Jacqueline is described as “the housewife who jinxed every electrical gadget she laid her hands on.”9

The manner by which Jacqueline became an electric person is most curious. At the age of 22, while pregnant with her second child and caring for her daughter of 18 months, she and her first husband, Ron, had a huge argument. This prompted Ron to take off on his scooter. Just as he was leaving, Jacqueline screamed at Ron that she “hoped he broke his neck.”10 Later that day, Jacqueline’s “wish” came true: Ron suffered a serious motorcycle accident in which he fractured his spine and neck. Before passing away in a hospital a month after the accident, he joked to the guilt-ridden Jacqueline that if he died he’d come back to haunt her.

Shortly after Ron’s death, Jacqueline was taking a bath when the light bulb above her exploded, showering her with broken glass and causing her to cut her arm. She attributed the incident to a faulty bulb and thought no more of it. Later, another light bulb exploded at the moment she happened to be walking past the cupboard where Ron kept his motorcycle leathers.

Around this time, vacuum cleaners, record players, electric kettles, electric irons, washing machines, dryers, and other appliances and gadgets in the home kept breaking down or would start “acting funny” for no apparent reason. The radio would switch stations even though no one had touched it, and the television “would change channels or develop double images without warning.”11Jacqueline was spooked by the electrical disturbances and became convinced that Ron’s ghost had indeed come back to haunt her.

One of the strangest incidents that Jacqueline experienced occurred on the night her two daughters were christened. (Jacqueline chose to have both daughters christened on the same day.) She was anxious about the occasion, however, because Ron had not been a churchgoer and she knew he would not have approved of the christening. That night, she says, two cut glass goblets, each of which bore the name of one of her daughters, suddenly and inexplicably shattered while sitting on a window ledge.

By the time Jacqueline married her second husband, Paul, an electric fitter, the electrical disturbances were still taking place. Doctors she consulted failed to take her claims seriously, and the tranquilizers she was prescribed only worsened her condition. In addition to getting “[static] electric shocks constantly,” Jacqueline experienced frequent headaches, passed out often, and suffered both bloating and constipation.12 Eventually she underwent a nervous breakdown and wanted to commit suicide. Because she “couldn’t make anything electric work,” Paul had to step in and take care of the cooking and cleaning.13

As her story began to attract media attention, she started to receive visits from reporters and psychic investigators, some of whom came looking for the alleged ghost. On one occasion Jacqueline became extremely angry with a female reporter because the reporter suspected her of being a fraud, at which moment the vacuum cleaner Jacqueline was holding suddenly “burst into flames.”14 Both Jacqueline and the reporter were startled by the incident.

Drawing on his knowledge as an electric fitter, Paul took it upon himself to figure out the cause of the electrical disturbances and hopefully put an end to the problem. He eventually concluded that Jacqueline was solely yet unintentionally responsible for the disturbances and that the problem stemmed from a high accumulation of static electricity on her body. He noticed, too, that the problem became particularly severe when she was having her period or feeling stressed or upset.

Professor Roy Gough of Stockport conducted an examination of the broken electric rings from Jacqueline’s cooker. He discovered that the rings had failed not because a fuse had blown inside the cooker but because their contacts had been high-voltage welded. This finding reinforced Paul’s conclusion that Jacqueline had damaged the cooker and other devices by means of an electrostatic discharge effect.

Paul concluded that Jacqueline wasn’t so much generating the static electricity internally but picking up and retaining more static than is normal. He conducted an experiment whereby he connected 10 fluorescent lights in series and asked Jacqueline to hold the two ends of the circuit while she rubbed her feet against nylon carpet. All 10 lights lit up.

Apparently, Jacqueline’s condition was more or less cured when, as per Paul’s advice, she began to eat more fresh fruit and vegetables as well as plenty of poached onions. Under the assumption that onions absorb static electricity, Paul suggested to Jacqueline that she hold an onion in each hand while walking around the house. Jacqueline adopted the practice and it supposedly helped reduce the amount of static electricity absorbed by her body.

Can the electrical disturbances that surrounded Jacqueline be explained in terms of electrostatics, and, if so, to what extent?

It’s a well-known fact that static discharges from the human body can damage sensitive electronic components. To eliminate static problems while fixing computers, IT technicians keep themselves grounded by wearing antistatic wrist straps and using other antistatic devices. Whereas to damage a sensitive electronic component inside a computer would require only a very small electrostatic discharge, to damage an electric cooker ring or vacuum cleaner would presumably require more static electricity than what the human body can normally deliver.

A capacitor is a device that stores an electric charge. The human body, when insulated, can store an electric charge, and therefore possesses capacitance. (Electrical capacitance is measured in farads [F]. The capacitance of the human body varies from less than 100 pF (picofarads) to more than 500 pF. [1 picofarad equals one trillionth of a farad.])

Your body is more likely to act as an effective capacitor if you’re wearing shoes that provide good insulation (for example, boots with thick rubber soles) than if you’re wearing shoes that provide poor insulation (for example, sandals). Also, having dry skin and being surrounded by dry air would further serve to increase the capacitance of your body.

The surface of the human body can easily accumulate up to 25,000 volts of static charge. However, when the charge gets released all at once in the case of an electrostatic discharge, the resultant current is somewhere in the μA range. This explains why electrostatic discharges produced by the human body, though sometimes painful, are far from dangerous and certainly never lethal; the current would need to be much higher for there to be any kind of danger.

The question arises as to how Jacqueline became so highly charged with static electricity. Paul of course believed that she was picking up and retaining more static than is normal, which is equivalent to saying that her body was functioning as a highly effective capacitor. A more plausible theory is that the static didn’t accumulate on Jacqueline’s body but was generated internally—as appears to have been the case with the “electrified” convicts at Clinton Prison.

So we know that static electricity can account for some of the electrical disturbances caused by Jacqueline. But can it account for all of the disturbances? The answer is no. In particular, it’s difficult to explain how static electricity was responsible for causing the two light bulbs to explode. There is simply no way to explain how a statically charged person can make a light bulb explode, especially without touching it. Plus, the first of the two incidents occurred while Jacqueline was taking a bath; meaning she could not have been statically charged.

And what about the shattered glass goblets? As with the broken light bulbs, it’s difficult to account for this incident in terms of static electricity. In fact, the incident has psychokinesis (PK) written all over it. If we accept that at the time of the incident Jacqueline was still plagued by guilt over Ron’s death, it’s reasonable to assume that attending the christening amplified her guilt and that she herself caused the goblets to shatter by means of PK, albeit subconsciously.

While we’re on this line of thought, it’s important to acknowledge Paul’s observation that the electrical disturbances became worse when Jacqueline was having her period or feeling stressed or upset. And let’s not forget that what triggered the disturbances to begin with—that is to say, turned Jacqueline into an electric person—was the emotional impact of Ron’s death.

The link between HVS and specific states of mind—in particular, stress—will be discussed in detail later. For the moment, consider the following account I received from a 50-year-old cleaner from New Zealand’s Kapiti Coast, named Kate R:

“This sort of thing happens to me quite a lot, usually when I am stressed about something. Street lights go on and off, radios turn to static if I am close to them, watches go backwards on me and digital watches only last a few days before the battery is drained. A compass is useless to me because it either just keeps spinning or it insists that true north is wherever I am. If I am really stressed I cause things to blow up—light bulbs either blow or explode out of their sockets. My kids won’t let me touch anything electrical if I’m stressed because I have blown up 2 televisions, 2 fridges, a cake mixer, a vacuum cleaner and more light bulbs than I can count.”15

Michael Shallis’s The Electric Connection is by far the most comprehensive study of cases of electric people written to date. Originally a film editor and director, Shallis entered university as a mature-age student to study astrophysics. He later became a lecturer in the Department of External Studies at Oxford University. While teaching a course at Oxford University on the nature of science and its impact on history, a student of his named Norma casually disclosed to him that she had a difficult relationship with electrical appliances and gadgets of all kinds. Intrigued by Norma’s story, Shallis began to research the matter. He placed notices in magazines asking readers to send him accounts of “electrical sensitivity” (his term for HVS). The replies he received numbered in the hundreds.

Since Norma’s story is what first inspired Shallis to research HVS, I feel it deserves mention here. Norma was raised in a rural home without electricity. At the age of nine, she was introduced to her first electrical appliance: a radio set owned by her uncle. Even though the radio was in perfect working order, she received a severe electric shock the moment her finger made contact with the radio set’s Bakelite knob. The shock sent her flying across the room.

Although Norma recovered from the accident quickly, it proved to mark the beginning of her difficult relationship with all things electrical. The problem worsened after she married. She discovered that being in close proximity to the television set, the electric cooker, and other devices in her home made her feel ill, both mentally and physically, and seemed to drain her of her will and vitality. At times she came close to passing out. She also discovered that things of an electrical nature had a tendency to malfunction in her presence, so that, for example, light bulbs would suddenly “pop” as soon as she entered the room.

One of the most extreme cases of HVS discussed by Shallis is that of a housewife and mother of three named Sheila. Sheila can’t touch her dog or shake anyone’s hand, for fear that they will receive from her a painful static shock. She feels uncomfortable whenever her body accumulates a high static charge; first she experiences a headache, then she feels shooting pains down the right side of her body.

If, when charged, Sheila touches a light switch or some other object, the sparks that flash from her fingers can be up to two inches long. Sometimes, too, being highly charged causes her hair to stand on end, to the extent that it hurts as if being pulled. Shallis states that on one occasion Sheila was tested at an electrical research laboratory at Salford University. The tests revealed that Sheila “could naturally produce 10 times more static on her skin than the researcher was able to produce artificially.”16

Like other electric people, Sheila frequently damages and disrupts electrical appliances and gadgets, in some cases without even touching them. On one occasion, she accidentally overheated and killed her tropical fish; this happened after she touched the fish tank thermostat. On another occasion, she suffered an electric shock while holding the iron. She saw a bright blue flash and was thrown hard against the kitchen wall. The entire base of the iron had blown out.

Throughout the years Sheila’s destroyed numerous irons, tumble dryers, and other electrical appliances in her home. She does the same when not at home. She’s caused cashier desktop computers to crash at her bank and deep freezer cabinets at her local supermarket to malfunction. Also, light bulbs often pop in her presence, and sometimes they explode when she tries to replace them.

It’s obvious that at least some of the electrical disturbances that surround Sheila are purely the result of static electricity. Speculating on the manner by which electric people damage and destroy electrical appliances, Shallis suggests that the electric person first causes minor damage to the appliance (for example, melting of insulation around wires) by subjecting it to an electrostatic discharge; after which mains electricity produces the bulk of the damage. Yet, he notes, “this explanation does not account for all the cases; it does not explain the ‘popping’ of light bulbs or other examples where objects are not touched by the charged person, nor does it account for the electrical devices that fail to perform correctly but do not ‘blow up.’”17 These phenomena, he suggests, seem to fall under the domain of PK.

In fact, his research revealed that many electric people possess psychic abilities of various kinds. Sheila, for example, can apparently perceive auras around some people, is often aware of who’s about to call her on the telephone, and has seen at least two ghosts. One of the ghosts was that of her deceased grandmother. The other was that of a man who’d lived and died alone in the house where she and her husband resided after they first got married.

As for the debate over whether electric people become highly charged with static electricity because their bodies generate it internally or whether the static is simply external in origin, Shallis subscribes to the former explanation. Electric people, he says, “seem to have their own internal [electrostatic] generators.”18

During a visit to Sheila’s home, Shallis was intrigued to notice that the roof was being repaired for damage caused by lightning. This made him wonder “if there was any propensity for lightning to be attracted to electric people.”19 He explains: “The result of my research was surprising…. In the sample cases of electrical sensitives I have studied, 23 percent have been the victims of lightning strikes and one-fifth of those have been struck twice.”20 Shallis states that one of the subjects in his study experienced two lightning strikes to her home and a single strike to the school at which she worked. Another subject in his study said he became an electric person as a result of being struck by lightning twice.

It wasn’t lightning or electric shock that caused Sheila to develop HVS. Rather, she became an electric person when, the same year her father died, she underwent an operation to remove a growth in her throat. She’s had two operations in addition to the one to her throat; one was to remove an ovary; the other was a hysterectomy. (Considering that Sheila had been close to her father, it’s possible that her emotional reaction to his death, rather than the operation to her throat, was responsible for her becoming an electric person. After all, Jacqueline became an electric person after suffering the loss of her husband.) Also, as a child Sheila was allergic or intolerant to 160 different foodstuffs, though today the number is much less.

Shallis discovered that Sheila wasn’t the only allergy sufferer among his sample of electric people. Nor was she the only one who’d undergone a surgical operation in the past. In fact, she very much fit the profile of the typical electric person. He explains:

“Eighty percent of my sample were women, with only a small fraction of them single, divorced or widowed. Nearly all of them suffered from static and the majority were allergy sufferers. Of all my subjects, more than seventy percent had had a surgical operation during their lives, many of these being major ones. Sixty percent of the subjects were affected by advancing thunderstorms, which included all the allergy sufferers… [A]lthough only twenty four percent of the subjects were made significantly ill in the presence of electricity, as many as thirty-one percent confessed to a real fear of electricity….”21

While, according to Shallis, only a small portion of electric people complain of adverse health effects from exposure to EM fields, most experience a number of unpleasant symptoms as an accompaniment to being highly charged with static electricity. Shallis lists these symptoms as headache, migraine, neck pain, nausea, disorientation, and a “feeling of being drained [of energy].”22Shallis discovered that many electric people experience the same set of symptoms, though not as strongly, prior to a thunderstorm, and he states that most of the symptoms can be attributed to a build-up of positive ions in the air, as happens during a thunderstorm. He goes on to state that air ionizers, which produce and fill the air with negative ions, can be used to counteract these symptoms. (This is because the negative ions neutralize the positive ions.)

What is an electric person exactly? And how does an electric person differ from someone with EHS? Or are the two conditions one and the same?

Based on the cases we’ve looked at in this chapter, it would appear that the following characteristics typify an electric person, or HVS sufferer: internal generation of static electricity (Wimshurst disorder); disruption of and damage to electrical devices and gadgets, partly by means of static electricity and partly by means of PK; multiple allergies and intolerances; and headache and other symptoms as an accompaniment to being highly charged with static electricity.

On the other hand, EHS is a condition whereby one feels ill from exposure to EM fields, with symptoms that include headache, difficulty concentrating, and reddening and burning of the skin. Another potential symptom is Wimshurst disorder, though this is more typical of HVS. EHS appears to involve a genuine allergic reaction (and hence an immune system response) to EM fields.

One major commonality between EHS and HVS is that, generally, both conditions are initiated by a single incidence of heavy exposure to electromagnetism. The three most common sources of exposure are lightning, mains electricity, and RF radiation. The culprit tends to be either lightning or mains electricity in cases of HVS, and RF radiation in cases of EHS.

If there’s one main difference between HVS and EHS it’s that most cases of HVS involve affecting things electrical, whereas most cases of EHS involve being affected by things electrical. Yet because EHS and HVS overlap to a significant extent, it would be erroneous to think of them as distinct conditions.

My research indicates that the incidence of HVS among the population is on the rise, and that, like its cousin EHS, the condition stems from living in an environment heavily polluted with artificial EM radiation. Much of the technology that gave rise to this pollution was created around the time of the Second World War. Nonetheless, there are plenty of cases of HVS that date back prior to this period, even as far back as the 19th century.

A perfect example of an HVS case from the 19th century is that of Caroline Clare of London, Ontario, Canada. The case was reported on June 23, 1879, in the St. John Daily Sun, under the title “A Human Electric Battery.”

At the age of 17, Caroline developed a strange illness that eluded medical diagnosis. Her appetite waned and she rapidly lost weight. Her health eventually declined to the point where she ended up confined to bed. It was then that she began to slip in and out of mediumistic trances. First she’d undergo fits and spasms; then her eyes would become glazed and her body almost ridged; then she’d “discourse eloquently and give vivid descriptions of far-off scenes, far exceeding in their beauty anything which she had ever seen or presumably ever read of.”23

The trances, which came and went over the period of a month, left Caroline physically and mentally drained. What made the phenomenon all the more odd is that Caroline was by nature a quiet and reserved young woman—not one to “discourse eloquently.” Her condition began to improve as soon as the trances ceased, and before long she was healthy and energetic again.

Although Caroline completely recovered from her illness, it left her with electrical and magnetic abilities. The Daily Sun article describes her as “a perfect battery,” and says she was “constantly giving off electric discharges.”24 If anyone shook her hand, or placed their hand in a pail of water with hers, they received a powerful shock. She was even able to send a sharp shock through 15 to 20 people joined by holding hands. Apparently, too, any object she touched remained statically charged for a very long time; anyone who then touched the charged objects would receive a painful shock.

As for Caroline’s magnetic abilities, it is said that metal objects were powerfully attracted to her body but that wooden spoons and other non-metal objects showed no such attraction. Knives would jump straight into her hand whenever she attempted to pick them up. She could also suspend needles from the tips of her fingers. Apparently, metal objects clung to her body so powerfully that the only way to release them was to have someone pull the object away from her while she rubbed her arm in a vigorous fashion from the wrist upward.

In addition to her electrical and magnetic abilities, Caroline supposedly exerted a strange mental influence on human beings and animals. When she entered a room, for example, some of those present would suddenly feel sleepy; others ill and fidgety. Sometimes dogs would sit at her feet in a motionless trance for hours on end.

How long Caroline’s abilities lasted, assuming they gradually weakened before disappearing altogether, remains unknown; the matter isn’t mentioned in the article on her in the St. John Daily Sun. Apparently, the case attracted the interest of a number of medical men, including a Dr. Tye of Thamesville.

On January 15, 1846, in the village of Bouvigny, northwest France, 14-year-old Angélique Cottin, a solidly built girl of short stature and below average intelligence, was busy weaving silk thread gloves in the company of three other women when the oaken table at which they worked suddenly moved of its own accord. The women were naturally alarmed by the event, and for a moment work was suspended while they attempted to figure out what had caused it. As soon as Angélique resumed her place at the table, it moved again. Whenever she touched the table, it suddenly retreated from her, almost in the manner of a frightened animal.

When the phenomena repeated itself at work the following morning, the public concluded that Angélique was possessed by a devil and that she ought to be brought before the parish priest. The priest witnessed in his home an impressive demonstration of Angélique’s abilities. A table retreated from Angélique the moment she touched it; and a chair on which she sat began to rock madly, as though trying to throw her off. The priest ruled out the involvement of witchcraft and was just as baffled by the phenomena as everybody else.

It wasn’t long before Angélique’s abilities became the focus of much public interest. Her parents, unable to resist the opportunity to benefit financially from the situation, organized demonstrations in which members of the public were required to pay a fee to see their daughter exhibit her abilities.

Angélique’s parents arranged for their daughter—the “electrical girl,” as she became known—to be brought to Paris in order to be studied by members of the French Academy of Sciences. The famous physicist François Arago (1786–1853), then secretary of the Academy of Sciences, headed the study. Angélique also participated in a series of preliminary experiments conducted by a Dr. Sanchon, whose detailed report on the matter, dated February 15, 1846, presents compelling evidence that her abilities were genuine and by no means the product of trickery.

In one experiment, Dr. Sanchon held a chair as firmly as he could using his foot and both hands. The moment Angélique sat down on the chair it was instantly “torn from my grasp.”25 In another experiment, which was repeated several times, a large and heavy dining table was suddenly “displaced and pushed” upon merely coming in contact with Angélique’s clothing.26 A similar experiment involved a large and heavy sofa. The moment Angélique sat down on the sofa beside Dr. Sanchon the sofa “was violently pushed against the wall.”27 Another experiment was performed whereby a chair was held to the ground by a number of strong individuals. After Dr. Sanchon had positioned himself on one side of the chair, Angélique sat down beside him on the other side of the chair. The moment she did so, Dr. Sanchon felt the chair “suddenly pushed from under me.”28

Dr. Sanchon discovered that Angélique’s abilities were most active during the evening from 7 to 9 o’clock. In his report, he argues that her abilities were due to a “gaseous current” or “fluid” that emanated from the front part of her body, particularly around the wrist and elbow region of her left arm. He goes on to state that her left arm continually quivered and contracted in an unusual manner and that it seemed a good deal warmer that her right arm. He also states that when Angélique caused items of furniture to be “thrown” it was because she’d touched them with her left hand as opposed to her right. Despite claiming that Angélique’s left arm was unusually warm, he says the fluid that emanated from this region produced a sensation of cold. As he states in his report: “I distinctly felt a momentary breath upon my hands, similar to that made by lips.”29

It’s fascinating that Dr. Sanchon literally felt an energy of some kind emanate from Angélique’s body. That he called this energy a “fluid” is perhaps due to the fact that electricity was once believed to behave in the manner of a fluid (hence the antiquated term “electric fluid”). Why he also called it a “gaseous current” might have something to do with an experiment he performed with Angélique in which she caused a piece of paper he’d balanced on his finger to be “blown away… as though by a sudden rush of wind.”30 He further claims that a small paper wheel placed vertically or horizontally on its axis was observed to rotate rapidly when brought in close proximity to the wrist or elbow joint of Angélique’s left arm.

Angélique’s ability to cause a paper wheel to rotate is reminiscent of a well-known exercise in PK that involves a simple device called a “psi wheel.” A psi wheel consists of a four-sided paper star balanced on the pointy end of an upright pin. The idea is to cup your hands around the device while concentrating on trying to make it rotate. Not once have I achieved positive results with the exercise, though apparently many have. (There are many videos on YouTube that purport to show people using PK to make psi wheels rotate. But because the effect is so easy to fake—for example, by blowing gently on the paper wheel—it’s impossible to tell if the videos are genuine.)

Much patience and practice is required before positive results appear, and even then it’s impossible to produce the phenomenon on demand.

If we assume that “psi practitioners” emit some kind of energy from their hands when successfully engaged in causing a psi wheel to rotate, it’s easy to imagine what the result might be if this same energy were to “leak” from the body: PK effects of an unintended nature, particularly around those areas where the “leakages” exist. Could the strange phenomena produced by Angélique be the result of such an energy leakage? This possibility is strengthened by the fact that none of her PK effects were intentional or intelligently directed.

Was Angélique a poltergeist agent? A poltergeist agent is someone around whom poltergeist disturbances occur. They seem to subconsciously fuel the disturbances and tend to be repressed and troubled young women going through puberty. Although Angélique meets all the criteria for a poltergeist agent, the phenomena she produced are distinct from those of poltergeist effects. There is, nonetheless, a very tenuous boundary between being an electric person and being a poltergeist agent. We’ll take a look at poltergeistry later in the chapter.

Like other electric people, Angélique’s abilities fall into two categories: (1) those that can be explained in terms of PK; and (2) those that suggest the involvement of electricity or magnetism. The PK category would include such phenomena as the movement of furniture and other large objects. As for the second category, the strongest evidence we have that static electricity may have played a role in the case is that Angélique was able to attract sheets of paper with her hand.

Dr. Sanchon made the interesting discovery that Angélique’s abilities ceased to function if her feet were prevented from making direct contact with the ground, either by having her seated on a chair with her feet raised in the air, or by placing a plate of glass or some other insulating material beneath her feet. It’s possible these findings have something to do with static electricity, though it’s hard to imagine how.

Continuing with our discussion of the second category, it is claimed that a magnetized needle suspended from the ceiling by a long piece of thread oscillated when brought in close proximity to Angélique’s left arm. It is further claimed that Angélique received a powerful electric shock whenever she touched the north pole of a magnet with the end of her finger, but not when she touched the south pole. When Dr. Sanchon made it so that Angélique was unable to distinguish north from south on the magnet, she still managed to tell which pole was which.

Perhaps as a result of an improvement in her mental and physical health, Angélique’s abilities eventually ran out of steam, disappearing altogether on April 10, 1846.

Having taken a detailed look at HVS, it’s time we examined the closely related phenomenon of streetlamp interference (SLI). Allow me to describe a typical SLI experience. You’ve just exited the cinema after watching the remastered version of the classic film Back to the Future. You’re alone, the hour is late, and the air’s a little chilly. Having spent the last of your change on popcorn and candy for the movie, you realize you have no other choice but to walk the 1.5 miles home rather than catch the bus. This involves following the footpath that cuts through the park. Given the lateness of the hour, the park has a somewhat ominous vibe.

As you walk down the path through the park, you feel a little nervous and try to maintain a swift pace. Then something odd happens: One of the electric lamps that illuminates the path suddenly blinks out as you walk underneath it, only to turn back on the moment you’ve passed it. Being a rational-minded individual, you decide the experience was a coincidence and think no more about it. The following week, while walking home from work in the evening, the exact same thing happens again, only this time three lamps in a row blink out as you pass them.

What on earth just happened? Did you influence the lamps with the power of your mind? Or is there a mundane explanation for these events? Whatever the cause, experiences of this nature are common, with people in many different parts of the world claiming “that they involuntarily, and usually spontaneously, cause streetlamps to go out. Generally the effect is intermittent, infrequent and without an immediately discernable sequence of cause and effect.”31

These words belong to the British paranormal scholar Hilary Evans, who, prior to his death in 2011, was the world’s foremost authority on SLI. In addition to being a pictorial archivist, Evans wrote numerous books on Fortean subjects. He was one of the founding members of the UK-based Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena (ASSAP), “a scientifically-orientated educational and research charity and learned society dedicated to a better understanding of anomalous phenomena.”32

Evans defined SLI as “an alleged phenomenon in which it is claimed that certain people, passing near a streetlight at night, cause it to spontaneously extinguish (or if off, come on).”33 He believed it to be a “phenomenon in its own right.”34 Many of those who contacted Evans to inform him of their SLI experiences had never heard of the phenomenon until coming across his research, and had previously considered their ability unique or doubted their own sanity. To quote one SLIder: “I couldn’t believe this was a phenomenon that others shared with me. I just thought I was nuts….”35

I am not a SLIder myself and when I first heard of the phenomenon it struck me as insignificant and boring, regardless of whether or not it had a paranormal basis. I quickly concluded that most, if not all, SLI experiences can be accounted for as a result of people perceiving connections that have no basis in reality. For, clearly, streetlamps can and do malfunction occasionally, and people are bound to walk past them at the moment these malfunctions occur. Only much later did I come to realize that we’re dealing with a genuine and very intriguing mystery.

Richard M., a professional magician in his 30s who lives in London, England, recalls the moment he became aware of his SLI ability. A 17-to 18-year-old teenager at the time, he was taking his dog for a walk when he noticed “that lights were going out when we walked under them and then flickering back on when we had passed.”36 He continues:

“It didn’t frighten me but I became conscious of it. I remember walking under them trying to make them go out but I couldn’t. The moment I stopped willing it to happen, it would start again—like someone catching me out. I sort of anticipated it for a while and didn’t really tell anyone about it. A few years ago, I noticed it happening again—the first time for a long time. Again, I was with my dog and this time we turned out a number of lights in a car park across the road. I told a close friend when I got home and he came out to watch from the other side of the road. As we walked around the park, they all went out as we passed under them, and then came back on when we had moved away… I seem to recall that both periods coincided with stress, some of it quite intense.”37

It’s noteworthy that the two SLI experiences described by Richard occurred while he was stressed. That a stressed or aroused state of mind encourages SLI ability is suggested by the testimony of a man from Harrogate, Yorkshire, England, named Dan C. Dan’s history of SLI began early one morning in 1991. Then 19, he was heading home from his girlfriend’s house, where the two of them had engaged in a steamy “smooching session,” when a streetlamp went out as he approached it. At first he attributed the incident to a “dodgy bulb.” Yet the lamp did the same thing the following night. It was when the incident happened the third time that he “started to think something was up.”38

Further strange incidents with the streetlamp followed. Dan explains: “Over the months, as I returned home from my girlfriend’s house, the light would always do the opposite as to its original state, i.e., if it was off it would turn on and vice versa. After I’d passed the light-post, it would usually revert to its original state….”39 Making the phenomenon all the more difficult to explain is the fact that Dan experienced SLI with multiple different streetlamps rather than only the one.

As was also true for Richard, Dan discovered the phenomenon behaved according to its own set of rules, largely resisting his attempts to control it. For example, on one occasion he attempted to demonstrate his SLI ability to doubting friends, only to make himself look foolish by failing to duplicate the effect. It eventually occurred to Dan that the phenomenon generally coincided with his being in a particular state of mind. He describes this as “quite tired, on edge, nervous of my surroundings…and I reckon my adrenaline levels must have been up.”40 He concludes: “This sort of explains why I couldn’t ‘perform’ in front of my friends, having been in a relaxed situation. I have since shut my friends up as I have shown my ability on more than one occasion.”41

The observation that a stressed or aroused state of mind encourages SLI ability deserves further comment. By “aroused” I mean sexually or emotionally charged. Of course, being stressed and being aroused are much the same thing. David P., a 48-year-old self-employed artist and photographer from Seattle, Washington, told me: “[SLI] seems to happen almost always when I am in a heightened state of mind, usually deep in thought about something troubling or stressful—but not always. Sometimes it happens when I am in an unusually good mood. Almost manic.”42 In addition to influencing streetlamps, David has “problems with electronic devices” such as “card-swiping machines at store check-outs, cameras and phones, computers etc.”43

That the state of arousal produced by sexual thoughts or activity plays a role in SLI is nowhere more evident than in the case of Robert L., a psychologist from Great Falls, Montana. Robert says his SLI ability became especially apparent when, at one point in his life, he was dating a woman who lived across the other side of town from him, to whom he paid frequent evening visits. It was while making these nightly trips that Robert occasionally saw rows of streetlamps switch off as he passed them in his car, so that “each lamp I passed would go out as I was passing it.”44 Robert notes that the phenomenon always occurred on those evenings when he and his girlfriend had had intercourse. “On other evenings some lamps would go out but not like on the ones when our passions had been aroused.”45

Whereas some SLIders say they affect only streetlamps, other say their ability extends to a whole range of electrical devices, from battery-operated wrist watches to railroad crossings to aircraft navigation equipment. Diana B., an office worker from Copperas Cove, Texas, belongs to the latter category. Not only do streetlamps dim and go out when she approaches them at night, but sometimes they also turn on when she approaches them during the day. Regular light bulbs and fluorescent lights also behave oddly in her presence, such as when she goes to a restaurant or enters the home of a friend. There have been occasions, too, when automatic garage doors have suddenly gone haywire on her, opening and closing quickly “in a crazy way.”46

According to Diana, her ability to affect electrical devices becomes heightened whenever she’s in a state of excitement or high energy. During these times, she can hold a compass in her hands and the needle will start to spin wildly, coming to a rest the moment she puts the compass down. Handheld tape recorders pose a special problem for Diana, either refusing to record when she wants them to or breaking down altogether. “I went through about 10 of them over a period of a couple of months. Once it was so bad it even wiped out what was on the tape.”47

Diana says she “gets very charged with static electricity, so much so that sparks actually fly around me and if anyone else is close by the sparks will connect with them.”48 Similar comments from other SLIders include, “I build up static electricity like crazy,”49 and “I seem to get more static shocks than other people.”50

Although I’ve chosen to describe Diana as a SLIder—since Evans refers to her as such in his book SLIDERS—it would be just as accurate to call her an electric person. In my opinion, all SLIders, regardless of whether they affect only streetlamps or both streetlamps and other devices, are electric people. SLI, then, is simply an aspect of HVS; it is not, as Evans concluded, a phenomenon in its own right. Of course, this still leaves us with the mystery as to why some electric people affect streetlamps only and others both streetlamps and other devices. The question we need to ask is this: What makes streetlamps “special” compared to other electrical devices?

Most modern streetlamps are of the low-pressure sodium-vapor variety. Low-pressure sodium-vapor lamps are filled with neon gas and a small amount of sodium. When first switched on, the neon gas is ionized, producing a red glow. This gives way to a steady monochromatic yellow as the sodium gas is ionized. The lamps automatically switch on at sundown, via the activation of a light-sensitive cell, or photocell. The cell is triggered again when sunlight returns at dawn, switching the lamps off. Generally, rather than each lamp having its own photocell, a single photocell is used to control a whole group of streetlamps.

Could the fact that many SLIders have issues with static electricity (in other words, suffer from Wimshurst disorder) in some way be responsible for the phenomenon? Although it’s true that someone with a high static charge has the potential to interfere with electrical equipment, they cannot do so from a distance; only by means of contact. That a statically charged person would be able to influence a streetlamp mounted high above them is therefore extremely unlikely. And let us not forget that some incidents of SLI occur while the individual is seated in their car, a car being a crude form of Faraday cage, blocking static and non-static electric fields.

No doubt at least some incidents of SLI can be attributed to entirely mundane causes. Skeptics of SLI are keen to point out that when the bulbs in sodium-vapor lamps reach the end of their life they undergo a phenomenon known as “cycling,” whereby they switch on and off every few minutes until a technician comes along and replaces the bulb. It can also happen that the bulb becomes slightly dislodged from its socket, so that even a minor vibration, such as that caused by a passing car or a person, is enough to make the lamp blink out for a moment.

Richard Wiseman, a professor of psychology at the University of Hertfordshire, England, cites “observer bias” as the reason for SLI. He explains: “Streetlamps are going on and off all the time because they are faulty or because their timers aren’t set properly. People only have to walk under a couple of lamps going off to think that they might be the cause.”51

Had Wiseman looked at the evidence properly, he’d realize that observer bias is not the whole story. When we eliminate this and other obvious explanations for SLI, we’re left with the possibility of PK. In a 1993 document compiled by Evans and published by ASSAP, titled The SLI Effect, PK is explored as a potential explanation for SLI. Evans explains that streetlamps are designed in such a way as to be protected from operating at too high a voltage, whereby a cutoff switch is triggered the moment the voltage reaches a certain level. The lamp will remain off until reactivated the following evening. A similar scenario occurs when the voltage drops below a certain level. Evans puts forward an intriguing theory: that the “force” at work in SLI operates by affecting the voltage of the current, most likely by causing a surge in voltage that triggers the lamp’s internal cut-off switch. He explains:

“To perform this feat, SLI would have to be an electro-dynamic force, somehow generated within or through the human biological system, and somehow externalized into the neighbouring environment, where it will act on any appliance which happens to be vulnerable… [T]here is good reason to think that [streetlamps] are particularly sensitive compared with other types of equipment: this could be because they operate at close to the critical level, or because it is not normally considered necessary to provide them with substantial shielding.”52

In my opinion, this is the best explanation for SLI that has yet been advanced. It supports my view of SLI as an aspect of HVS. As to the question raised earlier about what makes streetlamps “special” compared to other electrical devices, the answer would seem to be that streetlamps are simply more vulnerable to PK influence than other electrical devices. Presumably, too, SLIders who affect streetlamps in addition to other electrical devices possess greater PK ability than those who affect streetlamps only.

It’s also possible that, due to aesthetic reasons, SLIders “choose” streetlamps as targets for PK ability in preference to other devices. If we accept that SLI is caused by the subconscious mind, perhaps as an outlet for repressed emotions, it makes sense that the subconscious mind would prefer to influence a streetlamp than, say, a soft drink vending machine. Watching a can of Pepsi get lodged in a vending machine is fairly boring compared to watching a streetlamp blink off the moment you pass it late at night. The subconscious mind communicates in a symbolic fashion, and streetlamps have greater symbolic significance than do vending machines and many other devices.

In accordance with the subconscious mind explanation, SLI seems only to occur when the SLIder isn’t thinking about it or willing it to happen. To quote Randall S., from Denver, Colorado, who experienced SLI as a student while walking around campus: “Oddly, once I began to change my thoughts to the lights going out, they would stop going out.”53

If SLI is indeed an aspect of HVS, we would expect to find incidents of lightning strike and electric shock in cases of SLI. The aforementioned David P., who’s experienced SLI since his teens, has had a number of close brushes with lightning, the first of which occurred at the age of seven when lightning struck the house and knocked him to the floor. “Three times since, I have been close enough to lightning to be knocked down (but never struck directly, thank God),” he told me.54

Corby F., a 40-year-old auto mechanic from Los Angeles, California, also had an encounter with lightning as a child and nowadays experiences SLI. He explained: “When I was a child, I was indirectly struck by lightning; it hit a tree and an awning that I was touching. I was on dry pavement and unharmed, but felt the effects.”55 He added: “I was a teenager before noticing the streetlight phenomenon, mostly because I grew up in the country without streetlights… [U]sually I am driving when it occurs.”56

Specific mention is made of electric shock in several of the cases of SLI presented in Evans’s book SLIDERS. One such case concerns a technician from Plano, Texas, who said he first began to experience SLI after undergoing a serious accident with an electric welding machine, which left him paralyzed for two weeks and inflicted long-term damage. Another such case concerns a 17-year-old student from Baker City, Oregon, named John S. John said he had his first SLI experience at the age of nine, around which time he also had an accident while swimming in which he received a severe electric shock from grabbing hold of an electric cable. (No mention is given as to which event occurred first, though presumably the electric shock did.)

Is there a connection between SLI and EHS? The following quote from Evans’s book SLIDERS indicates in the affirmative: “Quite a few SLIders mention having a sensitivity to everything electrical, but only as a possible side-effect.”57 That SLI and EHS are connected makes sense in view of the fact that SLI is an aspect of HVS. As an example of a SLIder who also suffers from EHS, Evans presents the case of a teacher named Sarah B., from Croydon, Victoria, Australia. Sarah, whose EHS symptoms include exhaustion, mental fatigue, disorientation, and sleeplessness, suspects that her having EHS and her ability to affect streetlamps are related.

Poltergeistry is one of the most common, enduring, and closely studied of all paranormal phenomena. I doubt there’s a single parapsychologist alive today who doesn’t think poltergeists are genuine. The question is not whether poltergeist activity is real, but rather what causes the activity.

Most experts view poltergeist happenings as instances of recurrent spontaneous psychokinesis (RSPK), a term coined by the parapsychologist William Roll (1926–2012). Saying that poltergeist disturbances are caused by RSPK is equivalent to saying that the subconscious mind of the agent is responsible.

In addition to the RSPK theory, there is the less popular “spirit hypothesis.” (Polter is German for “noise” or “racket” and geist means “spirit.”) The theory states that poltergeist cases occur when one or more mischievous and boisterous spirits attach themselves to a vulnerable human being (the agent), whose energy they draw from in order to throw objects about and produce other physical effects.

Proponents of the spirit hypothesis include Colin Wilson and Guy Lyon Playfair. I myself subscribed to it once. However, since the existence or otherwise of spirits is such a thorny issue, there are no tools available with which to investigate the spirit hypothesis from a scientific angle. The RSPK theory is actually more exciting that the spirit hypothesis because it suggests that human beings are capable of remarkable feats of mind over matter, but that these abilities normally lie hidden and untapped.

Earlier we acknowledged that there is a very tenuous boundary between being an electric person and being a poltergeist agent. For the sake of comparison, it would help to take a look at a few poltergeist cases. So as to remain in keeping with the theme of this book, each of the three cases I’ve selected for our discussion features an abundance of electrical effects.

The Rosenheim Poltergeist case is named after the location in which it occurred: the Bavarian town of Rosenheim, Germany. The disturbances began in late-November of 1967, in the office of a lawyer by the name of Sigmund Adam. Light bulbs exploded in their sockets, showering the office with splinters of glass. Neon tubes unscrewed themselves from their sockets. Hanging light fixtures swung back and forth on their own. Electrical fuses blew with no apparent cause. The photostatic copiers continually leaked developer fluid. And the telephones went haywire. Sometimes all four telephones in the office would ring simultaneously with no one on the other end of the line. It was common for calls to be interrupted for short periods or to cut off entirely. Worst of all, the office was billed for hundreds of calls that the office employees swore they hadn’t made.

Hoping to get to the bottom of the matter, technicians from the local utility company visited the office to install monitoring equipment on the mains power supply to detect any unusual fluctuations. The equipment recorded deflections of up to 50 amps through the fuses. Amazingly, the fuses remained unaffected by the deflections; they hadn’t blown as they should have. The deflections tended to coincide with disturbances observed in the office and they continued even when the office was disconnected from the mains power supply and connected to a generator.

Furthermore, after technicians from the telephone company had installed monitoring equipment on the telephone lines to keep track of outgoing calls, it was revealed that a huge number of calls had been made to a time-announcement service number. The number had been dialed as rapidly as six times a minute. Again, office employees insisted that the calls weren’t theirs. And besides, some of the calls had been made when no one was in the office using the phones.

On December 1, 1967, Dr. Hans Bender (1907–1991) of the University of Freiburg, a parapsychologist and seasoned poltergeist investigator, arrived at the office to investigate the strange goings-on, which by that time were still in full force. He and his team set up their own equipment to monitor deflections in the power supply. They managed to rule out such causes for the deflections as variations in the mains voltage, electrostatic charging, demodulated high frequency voltages, external static magnetic fields, and ultrasonic and infrasonic effects (including strong vibrations). They concluded the poltergeist case was genuine and that no form of trickery was involved.

By this stage the disturbances had multiplied to include such PK phenomena as paintings rotating on their hooks, plates jumping off walls, and cabinet drawers opening by themselves. At one point, a heavy storage shelf, which weighed nearly 400 pounds, moved away from its position against the wall.

It soon became apparent to Bender and his team that the disturbances focused around a 19-year-old unmarried secretary named Annmarie Schneider. The disturbances occurred only during work hours, and only when Annmarie was present. Annmarie, who’d worked in the office since she left school in October 1965, was a tense and unhappy young woman who detested her job. In short, she possessed all the qualities typical of a poltergeist agent.

In a 1974 newspaper article that makes mention of the Rosenheim Poltergeist case and its agent Annmarie Schneider, Bender commented: “[Poltergeist] disturbances come from an actual emotional disorder. These people [poltergeist agents] are usually young, often adolescents, with very intense conflicts, especially sexual ones, and a very low tolerance of frustration. What happens is that quite unconsciously—they are not aware of it—the emotional conflict is converted into PK which causes the phenomena.”58

The poltergeist disturbances in the office ceased when Annmarie was let go by her employer. The disturbances resumed at her next place of employment, though they died out quickly and never returned. Around the same time she was sacked from the law office, her fiancée broke off their engagement. The two used to frequent a bowling alley together, where it was noticed that Annmarie’s presence had a disruptive effect on the electrically operated equipment. This so disturbed Annmarie’s fiancée that he decided he didn’t want to marry her. Bender offers an interesting perspective on the matter: “My own interpretation is that Annmarie unconsciously knew he wasn’t the right man for her and used her PK to discourage him.”59

This poltergeist case occurred in the mining town of Sosnowiec, in southern Poland. It began on the night of April 4, 1983, in the tiny apartment occupied by 13-year-old Joasia Gajewski and her mother and father. Despite being somewhat shaken by the recent death of her grandmother, to whom she’d been close, as well as going through puberty, Joasia was a normal adolescent leading a perfectly normal life. She spent the evening watching television with her mother and visiting grandfather. Her father, a plumber at the local steelworks, was absent that evening due to working the nightshift. When it came time to retire for the evening, it was decided that the grandfather, who’d chosen to stay the night, would share the sofa bed in the parlor with Joasia and that her mother would sleep on the cot in the kitchen.

All was peaceful in the apartment until 3 a.m., whereupon the grandfather felt something fall on top of him. The object proved to be a straw mat that hung over the back of the sofa. When he tried to place the mat back where it belonged, it tore itself out of his hands and began to dance around. At first he assumed that Joasia was playing a trick on him; however, he noticed she was asleep and couldn’t have been responsible.

Minutes later, all hell broke loose in the apartment as objects such as plates and glassware began to fly around in all directions. Some of the plates and glassware smashed hard against the walls. Joasia received several cuts to her body from being struck by fragments of broken glass. The “poltergeist” also caused windows to rattle and furniture to shake. The three wasted no time in fleeing the mayhem, taking refuge in the upstairs apartment of neighbors Jan and Gertrude Jach.

Later that evening, alerted by noise from below, Jan, Joasia, and her mother rushed downstairs to the apartment. Peering in from the safety of the doorway, Jach saw “glasses, plates, pots and a lot of other objects smash into the wall,” as he later described it to a Japanese journalist. “The noise was unbelievable…. Those dishes must have been flying incredibly fast because you couldn’t see them until they fell.”60 Scared of what might happen if they stuck around, the three ran back upstairs to Jach’s apartment.

That night, Joasia complained of a headache and fever that had started the previous day. She ended up spending the rest of the night at Jach’s apartment. Her illness remained for a number of days. Meanwhile, the poltergeist phenomena, which still consisted primarily of objects being thrown violently around the apartment, gradually intensified. It soon became clear that Joasia was the poltergeist agent.

That Joasia became ill around the same time the poltergeist phenomena erupted cannot be a coincidence. Interestingly, friends and family members observed that her body became highly charged with static electricity in the weeks prior to April 4. They even described her as “crackling” with sounds similar to those produced by fingers snapping. Later, after coming to the attention of Polish scientists, including a physician by the name of Dr. Eustachiusz Gadula, Joasia underwent a series of intensive medical and psychological tests. The tests revealed a number of peculiarities with respect to the teenager’s health, including that her body was indeed highly charged with static electricity. Indicating that this was a case of Wimshurst disorder and not regular static build up is that her body remained highly charged even when grounded. Also, thermographic studies showed that Joasia exhibited unusually wide and rapid changes in her overall body temperature, and, further, that she possessed unusual thermal spots (warm areas) around her head, toes, fingers, and slightly above her solar plexus. (As the reader will recall, a very similar phenomenon was observed with respect to Angélique Cottin.)

While studying Joasia, Dr. Gadula and his team witnessed a number of remarkable incidents of what appeared to be genuine PK of both a spontaneous and controlled nature. On one occasion, they watched in amazement as the armchair on which Joasia sat cross-legged (meaning her feet weren’t touching the ground) began moving around. The chair continued to move even after Joasia had removed herself from it. At one point it lifted off the ground and rotated rapidly. An attempt by three men to hold the chair down proved futile; the chair overpowered them.

As for controlled PK, Joasia was apparently able to bend metal cutlery in a similar manner to the famous Israeli-born psychic Uri Geller. Although the researchers saw her bend numerous pieces of cutlery, they failed to capture the phenomenon on film; Joasia was unable to perform when the camera was rolling. Assuming the phenomenon was genuine and not a trick, it supports the theory that the powerful “energies” at work in poltergeist cases can to some extent be harnessed by the agent and directed toward more constructive tasks than the senseless trashing of homes.

The poltergeist disturbances that surrounded Joasia, along with her metal bending abilities, persisted until she was at least 20, making this one of the longest running poltergeist cases in history. It’s been suggested that because Sosnowiec is located in an area rich in minerals and geological fault lines, the poltergeist phenomena was caused, or at least promoted, by some form of seismically-induced EM activity.

So far we’ve looked at poltergeist cases in Germany and Poland. This case is also European. It occurred in mid-2002 in the West Midlands region of the United Kingdom, in a town house occupied by a family of four: parents Ronald and Penny and their children Mary (aged 3) and Charles (aged 12 months). The case is unique in that it doesn’t belong in the category of a typical poltergeist haunting nor in the category of a typical ghost haunting; rather, it shares elements of both. It was investigated by members of the UK-based organization Parasearch, which is affiliated with both ASSAP and the Society for Psychical Research (SPR). Formed in December 1986 by David Taylor, Parasearch takes a scientific approach to cases of alleged paranormal phenomena, which includes working with consultants in physics, biology, archaeology, and other disciplines.

The complaints made by the family included a persistent sense of presence, a feeling of being watched, and electrical disturbances such as the sudden activation of battery-operated toys. Additionally, Mary kept waking up a 3 a.m. in a distressed state and mentioned on each occasion that she’d been visited in her room by a female apparition. There were times when Mary, distressed by the apparition, would make such comments as, “No, I’m not going with you. I’m staying with my daddy.”61Although many of the disturbances concerned Mary, the investigators identified Ronald as the primary focus and uncovered details regarding his past that suggested he might have EHS or HVS. He’d been struck by lightning once as a child and severely shocked twice by mains electricity as an adult.

As the disturbances began to intensify, the family members felt terrorized and reported hearing loud banging and hammering sounds emanating from the ceiling. On one occasion they saw a “bolt of lightning with five arcs discharge itself from one wall to the other.”62 (We can assume this was a large electrostatic discharge though not an actual bolt of lightning.) Spookiest of all, they witnessed on one occasion the child safety gate at the top of the stairs swing back and forth of its own accord.

As part of their effort to determine what might be causing the disturbances, the investigators inspected the property for strong EM fields and ultrasonic sounds. They found “strong electromagnetic and ultrasonic sources both in the older child’s [Mary’s] bedroom and in the parents’ room.” Having traced the problem to the central heating system, they discovered that, because it hadn’t been earthed, it acted as a receiver and transmitter for radio signals. About a month after the heating system had been earthed (which cancelled out the incoming radio signals), the family said the poltergeist phenomena had more or less ceased, save for the occasional unexplained noise, and that Mary was no longer being visited at night by the female apparition. The investigators concluded: “It is our belief that this case is an example of a low-level, electromagnetically-induced pseudo-poltergeist that is interacting with at least two individuals (Ronald and Mary).”63

Although there’s no way of knowing for sure whether the poltergeist phenomena were “electromagnetically induced,” the fact that the phenomena virtually ceased after the heating system had been earthed and the house consequently lowered of EM pollution certainly suggests as much. That Ronald had been struck by lightning as a child, as well as suffered two severe electric shocks, making him a likely candidate for EHS or HVS, also points toward an EM explanation.

As we’ll discuss in detail in the next chapter, it’s been shown that both natural and artificial EM fields can induce paranormal and mystical experiences in certain susceptible individuals. Thus, it’s possible the female apparition seen repeatedly by Mary was hallucinatory in nature and due to EM factors. This is not to suggest that the entire poltergeist haunting was one large hallucination, or that the case can be explained in terms of electromagnetism alone. The unusual movement of the child safety gate and the sighting by the family of a “bolt of lightning” inside the house indicate, respectively, the involvement of PK and electrostatic effects.

For most of us, making a cup of tea is one of life's simpler tasks. For Mavis Price, however, it is fraught with danger - because she can blow up kettles just by touching them. The 60- year- old grandmother seems to have a freakishly high level of static electricity coursing through her body. She estimates she has destroyed 15 kettles in the last few years. Housework has also become a problem, with 20 irons and ten vacuum cleaners biting the dust after falling foul of her apparently supercharged touch. And her friends and family are often left with their hair standing on end after touching her.

For most of us, making a cup of tea is one of life's simpler tasks. For Mavis Price, however, it is fraught with danger - because she can blow up kettles just by touching them. The 60- year- old grandmother seems to have a freakishly high level of static electricity coursing through her body. She estimates she has destroyed 15 kettles in the last few years. Housework has also become a problem, with 20 irons and ten vacuum cleaners biting the dust after falling foul of her apparently supercharged touch. And her friends and family are often left with their hair standing on end after touching her.

Mrs Price says her bizarre condition also means she cannot keep a computer in her house because they go berserk at the brush of her hand. "I am just an electrifying person really, who seems to build up an unusual amount of static," she said. "People have suggested going to the doctor, but I don't know what they would be able to do. "It is all a bit mind-boggling really. No one has ever been able to offer me an explanation to why this happens to me. I seem to carry far more electricity than normal people.

"People can often get electric shocks just by standing next to me. My grandson sometimes tells me off for holding his hand, because he gets a short, sharp shock from me. "It doesn't just happen at my house either. When I go to my daughter's house, the television crackles as I walk past it and people's hair stands on end by touching me or standing next to me. "I think the only option might be to wear a diving suit, rubber gloves and wellingtons."

Widow Mrs Price says her unusual experiences began more than 50 years ago and she has been causing havoc ever since. The retired community development worker, from Telford, Shropshire, added: "I first noticed it back in the 1950s when I plugged in a television set and ended up blowing up the television and flying across the room. "Since then, I have spent thousands of pounds on new household goods every few months. When I take them back to the shop to try and explain, I always get told they have stopped working due to wear and tear. But how can a kettle stop working after just a few months? It's ridiculous. "I had a really bad day last week where I got up, turned the light on, and managed to blow the fuse. Then I went to the supermarket and broke the checkout. "They had to close the checkout down and said nothing like it had ever happened before. "Just when I thought things couldn't get any worse I went to get some photographs printed and managed to completely freeze the whole machine."

Mrs Price said her electro-curse can create such mayhem that she was once unable to finish a training course. "I went on an IT course, but it was a nightmare because every time I touched the computer it would either freeze or shut down. "The technician had to constantly come over to my machine to see what was wrong and he was completely baffled."

Earlier this month, the Mail highlighted a similar case. Debbie Wolf claimed to be one of Britain's growing number of "sliders" - people who believe their presence interferes with household appliances, radios and lightbulbs. Miss Wolf, 38, of Telscombe Cliffs, near Brighton, says she can turn street lamps off, send digital clocks haywire and even defrost her freezer, but has no control over her power.

Her supposed ability is called Street Light Interference syndrome - or SLI - by experts.

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-517487/Meet-Mavis-super-charged-grandmother-touch-BLOWS-UP-kettles.html