6. The BBC Unleashed Malevolent Spirits On The UK
Over the years the BBC has been accused of many things, but you probably weren't aware that unleashing hundreds of murderous spirits on the UK was one of them. It started, like many great things do, on Halloween. The year was 1992, and the BBC was airing a ninety minute documentary called Ghostwatch, which was supposed to be a live investigation of a council house in North London. According to the advertisement, the house had experienced various supernatural activities over the past few months. Lending gravity to the broadcast, the investigation featured several prominent reporters, including Michael Parkinson, Craig Charles, Sarah Green and Mike Smith. Smith and Parkinson were stationed in a TV studio so that they could take questions and comments from the general public, while Green and Charles were situated at the council house. Over the course of the documentary, viewers were given details about the spooky phenomenon the house had experienced, including apparitions, banging sounds and moving furniture. At some point, strange things began happening in the middle of the broadcast: cats were heard crying, and marks appeared over the body of one of the girls who lived there. Things got so bad that Charles and the family evacuated the house, and it was hurriedly reported that by broadcasting the investigation live, a massive UK-wide séance had been created, unleashing spirits across the UK. Supposedly, reaction to the broadcast was so extreme that people all over England phoned the police to report what had happened, and several women are said to have been so terrified that they went into early labour. Of course, the whole thing was scripted, and had been filmed months before, but that didn't stop the UK from (briefly) freaking the hell out.