The Kadena AB Chicken Myth blog post generated some good paranormal stories. The Maintainer Nation Editor asked followers to post their own personal experiences on Maintainer Humor. This article is a compilation of their submissions. Many thanks to all who contributed!
(Editors Note: Not a Nimrod Aircraft)
J H - The haunted Nimrod killed two maintainers. The first was ingested during an EGR conducted without an intake guard. The victim was pinned against the IGVs and died soon after in hospital. The same aircraft later retracted a speed brake while someone had their head in exactly the wrong place at the wrong time. Nobody went anywhere near that jet on their own, ever. Did I mention that its tail number digits added up to 13 too?
Y P - When I was at Kadena Air Base working BDOC (base defense operations center) I would get 911 calls with nothing but static and a hang up, I would send a patrol to do a well fair check and when they got there they would relay that the building was abandon. All the rooms were completely empty, after letting comm know what happened they said "that shouldn't be possible, that building doesn't have the capabilities to call 911 or make a call in general" happened a few times while I was there. I wish I could remember the building number but all I remember was it was close to the flightline in a gated area. This would happen around 1-2am.
R B - The ammo dump on Kadena. Drive around the flight line road that runs parallel to 58 and you'll see stuff. Same with the other side. That whole island was creepy.
AC-130 Spectre Flag From Challenge Coin Nation
BPS - At RAF Lakenheath, there is a HAS with a giant ghostbuster symbol painted on the back. A couple of us were doing an X-ray in that HAS on midshift. We got everything set up and stepped out the door to press the button when we heard ghost sounds coming from inside… “oooOoOooOOOoooo.” It was so creepy sounding!!! We kinda freaked that someone might be in there trying to play a prank or something and we could have fried them with radiation. We went inside to search for anyone and there was no one around. We stepped back out the door to press the button again and heard the sound… again “oooOOOoooOoooOoo.” Again, we panicked, went back inside to look for anyone and there was no one there. This happened several times. We carried on with the X-ray but still freaked by the constant sporadic creepy ghost sounds. But one trip back inside to set up the film led us to the culprit! Our cooler that pumps fluid to the X-ray tubehead was low on fluid and was making that sound! We felt like idiots, but it was the middle of the night and quite hysterical how much we had been freaking out so all we could do was laugh.
SKS - Tinker Air Force Base 2015. When I was working midshift there was a period where every time at 0333 the radio would key across the net and we would hear a toilet flushing. At first we all thought it was a gag but leadership ended up posting people by every bathroom at 0333, and the radio would still key and we would hear a toilet flushing. We ended up calling them the phantom flusher.
MD - Super creepy noises on night duty in the hangar where top gun was filmed on MCAS Miramar. Heard a story that some jets crashed into the hangar before.
DW - When I was at RAF Lakenheath I would go out to the community centre at Sheppards Grove to volunteer. It was the Operations building for the airfield in WWII. I had heard stories of an incident in WWII where a pilot could not make it back to the field, avoiding a school and crashing close to the Ops building. One night while I was cleaning up the main room, I was taking a break and the lights were dimmed a figure appeared in the doorway dressed in British WWII flight gear, I asked if I could help but all I got in return was a shake no of the head. Went and walked down the long hallway, I went to follow but no one was there. Went down the hallway and into the only open door and walked through an extremely cold spot. Never found anybody and I was the only person in the building and all the doors were locked. This only happened once but I do remember it vividly. Also, as I worked AR swing shift and occasionally mids would have weird experiences in numerous HAS (Hardened Aircraft Shelter) to include 42. On top of the jet working and would hear footsteps, people talking, shadows out the corner of your eye and ice cold areas during summertime. Lakenheath has the most paranormal things happen.
NM - When I was in MOC (Maintenace Operations Center) at Holloman AFB we were in a cypher locked room but we had cameras pointing toward the door and hallway and adjoining room. When I was running late man, or 12s by myself and the cameras would kick into night mode and it would sometimes look like there was a person standing in the corner facing the wall, you'd look again, and it was gone.
TF - My buddy was AGE at Kadena and was told to go out and get an 86 for inspection at the ready line at the far end of the flightline. No big deal, right? Well, he goes out there in the bobtail he pulls up and sees an Asian dude’s head pop out from behind the 86! He said he had that bobtail floored at 25 and got out of there. He got back and his shift lead asked why he didn't bring it back. He straight up told them to give him paperwork he was never going out there at night without someone else again! 100% believe this guy.
OB - Working AGE on swings at Osan AB. Was with a buddy smoking on Charlie diamond when we could hear crying coming from one of the abandoned buildings in the center of the diamond. It was coming from the inside, and it sounded like multiple people. Someone else heard it too since it was called out over the radio. A few minutes later the Security Forces and Fire Department showed up and entered. They came back out calling an all clear, but they left the lights on walking out.
AR - Got a few from Kadena AB. Had one when my kind’s baby monitor started crying with his voice. The problem was, my kid’s bedroom was on the second floor, and I was sitting in the living room with him on the first floor. Yeah, he didn’t sleep in that room anymore after that. I’ve also had some when I was working at MOC during the graveyard shift at weekend duty, so I was the only one who was in the secured office, and the back office lights would flicker on and off, or Casper would make only on phone ring every five minutes, but there would never be anyone on the other line.
RS - My first base was Tinker AFB, as an AWACS crew chief in training at the time my classmates and I stayed at Loop Hall. A lot of weird stuff would happen. The NCOIC for the weekend would stay on the third floor and wait for us to check in and they would always talk about how they saw shadows walking in front of the office. Not only that but my roommate heard bumping coming from the other room, he texted the guy who lived in that room to quiet it downs because sit was like 1 am and the dude texted back “I was gonna say the same thing to you”. Another time everyone besides me was downstairs using the Latte Lounge WiFi to play CoD. I went downstairs for a second and went back to my room, at that time all the doors, closet doors, refrigerator bathroom door, windows too. All of them were open. Stuff was crazy.
DB - This is what I heard from my time in Guam. There is a haunted parking spot at Andersen AFB Guam. Every time they park an aircraft on that spot, something always happens. B-52 parked on the spot to test radar, the specialists were out working the aircraft. One person in the pilot seat, 2 people in the radar nav seat and bomber seat. 2 more outside keeping the area clear. After a few min of running radar, the guy in the pilot seat looked over and saw a full body gray ghost in the copilot seat. The guy got up, ran back to the ladder, never hit any rungs on the way down, landed on the floor, turned and went out the bottom and ran away down the taxiway. If you look at the Google map of the base, that spot now has an X on it to keep people from putting anything there.
KB - Aviano AB area G building 1525. I work Mids and have been for quite some time and never really noticed anything weird until I moved buildings to 1525 and started the first mid shift in that building. I swear I would be down in one of the bays doing an inventory of assets and I’d hear someone walk up so I would stop and look out the door and no one was there that happens pretty consistently at around 4-5 in the morning. I would send the other people home early on Mids and I’d be stuck alone in the building for the rest of the night and I swear on my life I would hear footsteps come up the stairs to main room never hear the door open but could hear the steps continue right up so my desk and then stop, I put in some AirPods and blasted music all night I was scared witless and safe to say I aways have at least one person on shift with me.
DL - At Dyess AFB there is a haunted hangar. A guy hung himself in early 2008. It was very eerie there. I never personally experienced anything, but I have friends who had. They would say they would be the only one in there and could hear tools drop just stuff like that.
JB - I've been living in Okinawa since '15 and as far as hauntings I never really experienced anything on the line other than strange feelings of someone is there but isn't. However, lately I was teaching a night class at the FTD building and had sent the students home, all other class doors and lights had been locked and turned off by the previous instructor but I was doing a last minute walk-through and saw a door open and the lights turned on, no big deal all lights were upgraded with motion sensors, but when I went to turn the switch off the lights stayed on so then I flipped the switch the other way and they went out. Needless to say, I locked the door and left immediately.
AS - Another incident was at Luke AFB in 2003. I was working mids and was walking down the ramp from the echo row back to the 63rd. Had to have been near 1am. The whole area was dead silent and I looked up to see three circular lights in a straight line, maybe 10 ft apart roughly 100ft above me. They weren’t moving, just hovering there with a vague outline like a cigar tube around them. First thought was helicopter, but it was silent. Looked around to see if anyone else was out there that could see this thing and when I looked up it was gone. I chalked it up to being tired as hell and not enough caffeine. Weirded me out though.
JF - I was on mids in the 909th at Kadena and was finishing up a job in the boom pod. I was the only person on the jet. I ‘m laying in the pod when I thought pro super had stopped at the jet because I heard someone climbing up the ladder and then just a few footsteps on the cargo floor and then stop. I didn’t pay any attention to it as I was working. I start picking up my tools, tossing them in my bag near the APU cabinet and I look down the plane and I remember someone coming up but I didn’t see anyone. I thought they must be in the flight deck reviewing forms so I headed that way. No one there. Then I remember that I didn’t hear that ladder again for someone leaving. Just odd. That’s the only thing I’ve ever experienced.
EP - On the bottom of Delta Row one night we were working on one of our Talon IIs. We heard a loud Crack and some kind of white light flew through one paratroop door and out the other. It was the craziest thing I have ever experienced in my life. It wasn't electricity and it wasn't anything like I've ever seen before.
PB - I was in the 908th MX engine shop at Maxwell AFB. Our building was an old hangar that had us and the avionics shops inside. I was told by all the old guys that the building was used as a temporary morgue for bodies returning from Vietnam. One of the guys in the shop slept in the office a few nights but got freaked out by noises and seeing things so he ended up staying with someone else. I stayed late one night working on some cylinder heads for my car and heard one of the avionics doors open and close. I walked around but that side of the building was dark, and all the doors were locked. After that, I took my stuff to the auto hobby shop.
CH - 2015, working a KC-135 in Al Udeid. Got dropped off around midnight to remove and replace a relay or a gauge back in the boom pod, some relatively easy but time consuming piece of work on a jet that was far enough away from the AMU I needed a ride and a radio. Anyway, it's been pretty quiet and uneventful. I'm in the back, finishing up some string tie about an hour later, and I hear someone come up the crew entry ladder, floor grate latch, floor gate drop, then some footsteps headed back to about the galley. I figure it's my 7 level, and I get up from the boom pod, making my way forward. I've got my headlamp on, but I don't see anyone up there, which is odd, but I don't think too much of it. No light from the latrine, nobody in the cockpit, but I just shake it off.
Well, I get downstairs, inventory tools, call for pickup; my 7 level shows up, inspects the work, signs the forms, and we get loaded into the bread van. I ask him if he'd been up there about 15 minutes ago, "No," he says. I ask if anyone else had been at that jet, again, he replies in the negative, and that "the radio has been pretty quiet, why?" I tell him that I heard someone come up, but nobody was up there. He asked for the tail number (I don't remember what it was, now), and he looks me dead in the eye, "Yeah, that one was one of the old body haulers from Vietnam," and we drove back to the AMU.
I have no idea how to explain that experience besides ghosts, because I didn't see anyone, and I know I didn't hear anyone exit the jet. Overwing and aft hatches were closed, so the only way in or out was the crew entry ladder. But I'm positive I heard someone come up.
DM - Kadena AB: 1995-1997, Dorm 108 (Torn down, was behind bowling alley) My room was once used for storage prior to my arrival, they basically had no space. I had pictures fall from the wall and it just felt creepy. Upon return from a TDY my neighbors told me they had no clue I left because they could hear conversations going on in my room. Yep, I moved out of that room. There was also a sighting of a Japanese soldier in the day room area, not by me.
Fairchild AFB: 2010-2016, KC-135 SPOOK 50. Had two separated incidents occur while performing MTI's on it. First one occurred while cleaning the QD masks near the Nav table. Heard someone exhale behind me as if impatient, turned around and nobody there. The A1C with me was back near the APU. Second incident, three of use standing there talking near the cargo door and a quarters fell directly in front of us. We all had bags in our hands and nobody else was on that jet. Also heard some booms tell stories of seeing someone sitting out back and strange lights. Fun stuff!
Fairchild AFB IG/WANG SF building. While working there a number of people have heard the sound of furniture moving after everyone left. I heard what sounded like car keys rattling in the small locker room while I was in the bathroom. Also had the motion sensor sink activate when nobody was standing near it. Very low traffic building over on the old ANG campus.
JL - I was at Davis Monthan AFB back in 07-08. The old C-130 fuels hangar was one of the oldest on base. One night I was in the circuit breaker room turning the lights off for the hangar. Once I finished flipping the switches and stepped into the hangar. I heard a few more breakers pop. There was no one else in the hangar and no way to get into the breaker room. Those breakers were heavy so wasn't gravity. Needless to say I cleared the hangar and got to the office in a split.
RC - I was a Thunderbird crew chief from 2003-2006 and I experienced something unexplainable one night on Swings. The Team moved to Nellis from Luke in 1956. The Team has been in that same hangar on Nellis since then. All but one Thunderbird killed on duty has passed through the doors of that hangar.
On December 21, 1972, Capt Jerry Bolt, Slot #4, and TSgt Charles Lynn, F-4 crew chief, were killed during a FCF at Nellis. There is memorial painting for TSgt Lynn with all the Thunderbirds jets with the F-4 pulling up in a Missing Man maneuver. It is in the hallway where MOCC and the flight offices are. All maintainers were told about TSgt Lynn haunting the Mx side of the hangar since then. Drinks randomly spilled, doors blew open or closed, lights flickered etc. Some claimed to have heard footsteps at night.
In 2005, three of us were closing up the Hangar for the night. As we talked at the bottom of the stairs, the lights in the upstairs hallway came on and we distinctly heard footsteps. We hollered to see if anyone was upstairs, got no , and switched the lights off. Again, the lights came on and audible footsteps. Thinking one of our teammates was pranking us, we split up to check that all offices were locked, bathrooms were empty, and the doors to the exterior stairs were locked. Satisfied no one was upstairs, we met up at the foot of the interior stairs. The lights came on and footsteps were heard again. We all looked at each other and in unison said, " Good night, Sergeant Lynn! The hangar is locked up and we're going home!"
JB - Shaw AFB. 4507th CAMS. 1990. Our phase hangar was rumored to have been a temporary morgue during Vietnam. It was an old, rickety wooden structure. Didn’t help we were working on Vietnam era OV-10’s, some still with ABDR patches. Many of us working mids had some freaky story. Tools suddenly rolling off of a table in the dark with a “clang” as they hit the floor. One late night I’m deep into a wire bundle in the little OV-10 cargo bay, no one around, and like someone was inches from my ear, I hear a quiet, “Hey.” I look over and see nothing but the dim light of an empty hangar. I walk over into Support, they were all gone for midnight chow. I was the only soul in the structure, or maybe I thought…. Hair still raises on my neck when I think about it. Next day I ask one of the NCO’s, “Is there anything ‘weird’ about that hangar?” He chuckles, “you too?”. “Yeah it’s true. Work in this unit long enough, everybody is going to have some encounter. Freaks us all out the first time.”
MF – RAF Lakenheath Charlie Ramp about a year ago on mids, around 0300. Me, my expediter and crew are finishing up configuring a WLT bird. If you haven't been to Lakenheath, it is never quiet on the line. Either 15s running AGE, 35s running aux power, jets being towed, or even just the slightest breeze. As I'm finishing torque on a pylon, I notice the entire line, goes dead. No noise. Enough to trigger my tinnitus. I ask my 3 man if he notices it too, and he cracks a joke about skinwalkers. Within 10 seconds, we hear what can only be described as a skinwalker behind PAS 24, just a deep, low growl. And it goes on, and on. At this point now I'm getting spooked. I tell my crew to finish setting up for ops checks so we can get the hell off the line. Right before we start, the growl goes away, and all normal ambient noise fades back in. I haven't had it happen since, but now I really do believe in the witching hour.
BK - During one of my deployments with the 41st EECS, I became convinced that the planes do have their own personalities and quirks. Had one tail that just refused to keep its radar system in working order, and every 30 days would shit an RT like clockwork. Mind you, this was the APN-59 system, so that RT was an 80 pound cylinder about as big around as a keg and 2/3s as tall. And it was mounted in a spot that was 5-6 feet off the ground inside the Herc's NLG wheel well. Finally managed to figure out what was causing the RT's to fail, but still took a couple of months of get to the root cause (hard to troubleshoot what ain't broke). Same deployment, walked out to launch a plane and, within a wing's length of the plane, made the mistake of thinking "this is nice, haven't had a radar problem in a while." Changed 3/4 of the damn system when that plane landed, because apparently the plane can read minds and decided to punish me for my hubris (also APN-59 sucked in that the whole system is effectively wired in series, so it wasn't uncommon for one box to pop and take several other components with it). That same deployment, had another plane in one of Bagram's fuel cell hangars for, once again, radar problems. The hangar was having some work done on the fire suppression system, so imagine the pucker factor when the fire alarm starts going off and you see the nose dock garage door start trying to close, only for it to bounce off the power cart cable and open back up again just for the fire suppression system to make it close once more. Definitely had the heart rate up trying to get the plane shut down and clear the hangar because we didn't know what the hell was going on at that moment.
JE - An airmen and I were working at PAS 46 at Lakenheath on mids one night. I had to run back to the shop for something so I told him to keep working. When I drove back he was standing 200 feet away from the PAS. I asked him what he was doing and he said he heard children's voices and weird noises. He was pale and wouldn't go back inside. I told him to hang in the truck and I was on top of the jet working and I heard the sound of a ratchet hitting the ground. I didn't drop anything but I got off the jet to look and didn't see anything and then I heard a little girl laughing. Grabbed the tools and we went back to the shop and turned it over to dayshift.
BJ - On Kelly AFB they don't drink the water. Story goes, there was a gigantic fuel spill and it saturated the ground so much, they had to abandon the entire area including buildings etc. It was fenced off. Supposedly the water source /pipes are permanently contaminated. 6 people have died from cancer in the engine shop since the incident. It is one of the closest shops to the original spill. Those 6 people have been said to haunt the engine shop. One time, I was in their break room. I was sitting there with about 4 other people. All the sudden, dishes are thrown into the sink. One guy who was skeptical, said they just shifted. Right after that, a tech wipe was pulled straight up into the air from a box of tech wipes. The box was sitting on a table in front of me. No one else was near it. The wipe was pulled straight up in the air by some unseen force. Then the box flew onto the ground. The skeptical guy said it was the wind. The rest of us were freaked the f out. Other stories that have been said to take place on the night shift are not uncommon to hear about like whistling, doors locking, and lights flickering.
DS - Working mids at Charleston AFB and getting on a C-17 in the middle of the night to search for forms. Happened a few times but sense of something being there plus, noise, temperature and thinking I saw shadow movement. Some of those tail numbers at night by yourself black jet, in the cargo bay was odd.
BJ - Bitburg AB, Germany Summer 1989. - All of the Tabvee's are named for people that are deceased or after a significant battle. The entire area was bombed during WWII, so most of the Tabvee's are haunted. I've heard unexplained laughter, but the one that scared me the most. Was in a Tabvee with 79-0010, front door, back door, and the crew door were all closed. It was the middle of the summer and it rapidly got cold, you could see your breath. Then all the streamers on the pins and -21 started fluttering, but there was no wind. I was out of there!! I'll never forget that.
ME - I was in a dark C-5, which had just arrived for M mod, raiding light bulbs for another plane on graveyards. I was checking the FE cabinet when I heard what sounded like someone getting up or down in the relief compartment seats. I announced myself (thinking that someone -certainly not a maintainer- was catching a nap) and went to check the cabinet in the bunk compartment. There was no one in the whole area, but one of the hangers in the coat rack was swinging back and forth. I figured that a bird had worked its way in, but I still saw nothing. Looking back at the "boiler room" door, I saw it swing open, ever so slightly. Now, as a horror fan, I knew what happens to the minor character that goes through that door, so I headed out. As I passed the coat rack, the hanger was swinging with just as much momentum as before. One of the other electricians on the crew said that he'd heard whispers on the same spot while hooking up a power cart and absolutely refused to go back to that spot alone.
WS – Joint Base Lewis McChord Hangar 14 abandoned except for the large part indoor storage for C17 items. Weird noises late at night and crates being randomly misplaced. Older civilians working there refused to go into the building after dark. Also, the LRS mobility warehouse we would hear voices at night on the other end when doing weapons vaults checks.
MP - I remember around august 2009 Lakenheath there was this semitransparent girl sitting on the bench outside the PX. Spooked the hell out of me. I chalked it up to stress and being tired.
JR - 1997, I’m a young C-5 crew chief at Travis AFB. So a previous night, I had gone out with a crew to do a post wash lube on C-5, 70-0464 which was located in hangar 818, which is a full size hangar that a C-5 can fit in. We did a post wash lube on mid shift and went home the next morning. Next night, I come into roll call and get told that QA had been out to inspect our work and I had missed some points in the NLG. I was to go out that night and redo the NLG. No turnover, just myself to finish the work. Get dropped off at a dark jet but lit up hangar and get to work by grabbing a B-4 at the wing to walk it under the nose and get the work done. As I walk back to the nose, I get this sensation someone is looking at me, I look around in hangar and I don’t see anyone, I then look up at the co-pilot’s and I see what appears to be a face in the window. Then I see it kind of smile at me. I’m like, “Nope, nothing to see” and proceeded to finish my work.
Work gets done and I call for my expediter. He rolls up and asks for the forms and tells me they’re on the flight deck. I jet upstairs and get to the top, I see the forms on the FE’s table, grab the forms and turn around to go back down. Then before I head down, I feel all the hair on the back of neck stand on end. I look towards the relief crew and courier compartment and I see what appears to be a black mass coming from the EV room towards me. I proceed to go down both flights of stairs in record time. I hand the forms to my expediter, while keeping an eye the flight deck to see if this mass comes but it does not. He signs off my work and tells me to put the forms back. I ask if I can leave the forms at the top of the crew entry door stairs and he’s okay with this. Even going up those stairs, I keep an eye on the flight deck. Put the forms up, grab my stuff and hop in the front seat. I tell my expediter, who’s a MSgt and we were allowed to call him Steve on the line, about everything that happened and told him that I’d rather take an article 15 than go on the plane again by myself. He just nods and says “Okay” and until I left in late 2000, I never worked that plane by myself.
That plane is now a memory as it’s been chopped to pieces at the Boneyard but I did hear from one of my friends who was the DCC on that jet that it had history of carrying bodies back from Nam on in it.
LK - At RAF Mildenhall my 2nd week there I was coming around the roundabout to get to base and I see this 6ft tall guy plain as day wearing his ABU’s off base walking in the grass without his hat on and I said out loud “look at this guy, wearing his uniform off base and without a hat” shaking my head. My husband looks at me with big eyes and says, “what guy?” When I went to point him out there was no one there. I cried the rest of the way home. I just remember feeling something so heavy in my chest about it. I went to the Inprocessing meeting the next day and they briefed that several members had died on that road and 2 members just had their anniversary’s this month… shook me up for awhile.
KLA - Engines shop bay, Nellis AFB 2020. I was around there (mid shift maintainer) and the only female bathroom is in the giant warehouse. It’s known to be creepy at night and has lights that turn on and off but eh, every facility is sinking on Nellis and breaking. Anyway, one night I’m running over and I unlocked the door and the lights turn on and I see someone hustle by really fast. and then the lights turn off. I walked over and the lights turned on, once again, and no one was there. After I walked back I asked another “hey is it common civilians to be working this late on engines?” My buddy looked at me weird “no they left early today and locked the entire building, I double check when I take over shift.” I told him what I saw and he laughed and said, ya know you’re the 6th person to tell me that happened and every time I think it’ll never happen again! I wanted to fight him.
JR - Back in 08 I was on call and flightline needed an engine at roughly around 0100. I had been told stories of how people heard what sounded like children playing around in the shops when nobody else was around. Didn't think anything of it. Till I went in to open up the shop that night. Heard school children playing in the back of the shop and didn't see anything. I opened the bay doors and waited outside for the flightline crew to show up before going back in.
A different night I woke up because my wife was moving back and forth in her sleep a lot, saying a bunch of words under her breath. I tried waking her, and she finally turned over with her eyes wide open and screamed at the top of her lungs at me, hit me in the face with the pillow a few times and then turned back and went to sleep. I woke her up immediately and tried to tell her what happened. She didn't have an elevated heart rate; she could barely keep her eyes open from being so tired and couldn't recall anything that just happened.
JG - Was a single when I went to Yokota AB, assigned to building 220, room 321. Drinking with a buddy, watching a movie when we hear “HELP HELP!” Stick my head out the door, sees blonde bowl cut on a child heading down the stairs. Chase after him. Make to the ground floor before running into people who never saw a child. (Yes, I checked the 2nd floor hallway, it was right there!)
SM - Duck pond in Kadena bomb dump one of my friends saw a wet little kid standing on the side of the road then in her rear view as she drove by at night. Munitions inspection building had a dead phone outside that would ring then be static when answered. Yet our favorite thing to do on weekends was to go drive around in there in the middle of the night, mess with new guys and see what else we could find. Creepy place overall.
CA - At Incirlik, AB, Turkey in 2002, first night a dorm room (2nd floor, next to and facing the hospital), I woke up in the middle of the night to see the top half of a man bend THROUGH my window, right over my face, look me up and down, and then vanish. I immediately rearranged my room (and began a tour-long relationship with Jack Daniel's). He looked PISSED, Turkish, and was wearing a light yellow button-down shirt. It was quick but I can't forget it.
CM - CVN-69 on the 0-3 deck midway down the ship there is a passageway that leads out to the catwalk by the bomb farm. It's about 15-20 feet with a door on each end and there's not a single bit of light in that space. Was one night about 2am I was moving pretty quickly out to the flight deck, and I can hear someone running on the steel grates of the catwalk outside. The door on the other end of the space swung open, and I see through what little moonlight what looks like someone running in directly at me so I turned my shoulder and braced for them to run into me... wouldn't be the first time. Thing went right through me, and the door slammed shut again. So I'm standing in this pitch black hallway trying to figure out wtf just happened. Pulled out my mag light, and there was nobody there. Other door never opened, nobody ever hit me. I just chalked it up to being exhausted, but you can't convince me that boat isn't haunted.
SC - Few different instances at PAS 46 at Lakenheath. Blast doors would rattle, side door would close, lights flicker. Once we sent one of our 4 man crew back for tools we needed for ops checks and were in the unofficial "smoking area" in the back of the Pas (if you know you know) waiting for said crew dog. Sounded like the footsteps of said crew dog coming to join us. We even called out to no response. Looked around the corner and no one was there. Just a stinky jet that didn’t want to keep hydro inside her. Hated going to that Pas. Especially alone. Just always has an eerie feeling in there. This was practically all on midshift. 2017-early 2020.
JB - PAS 46 at the Heath is the only reason I believe in ghosts/spirits.
RC - Misawa in the north base side there's a playground, even has sf cameras. One night a unit gets sent there for kids playing at 2am. The sole security forces airmen arrives, walks up sees nothing. Calls back to HQ, who quickly tells him on their camera the kids are right next to him..... was told the E-club there had weird things happening too, some story about being bombed back in the day.
TT - Mildenhall, was working in the JOAC building as MOC and had cameras watching the doors into the building and a couple hallways. Would see a figure on the cameras out of the corner of my eye on mids knowing I was the only one in the building. Definitely gave me chills several times while there. Even had my buddy on shift with me ask if I saw anybody in halls when I came in from a smoke break.
MV - Dorms at Nellis AFB, would see shadows walk past my doorway to the kitchen. The heavy doors would shut with no windows open or air on, Viper AMU on mids was the creepiest on Sunday nights. Always felt like someone was in the hangar even when it was empty.
RR - Our berthing compartment on the Forrestal was haunted. It was right under where the big fire was. We had lights turn on and off at random, the TV would change channels by itself. We heard footsteps and hatches opening/closing. Several of the freezers near the aft galley were haunted as well. That's where all the bodies were stored prior to burial at sea or off load.
SR - Had a dude on mids at a Guard base I was at say that sometimes the flight chief office light would come on and a chair would roll out of the office. Different dude came in on a weekend and said the chair would roll out the office and the lights would flicker. Don’t know if it was the rats or a ghost lol.
WP - Edwards AFB Nightstalker (allegedly) attacked a guard shack at the Rocket Lab. Large scratches on the outside of the guard shack and shots fired from the inside-out.
BY - Heard a story of a man would ride his bike across the runway in the middle of the night at Lakenheath and tower would call SP’s and they would go out there but no one would be out on the runway or time the ghost would be next to the SP’s on the runway and only Tower could see the person.
SF - There is an old training dorm on Tinker AFB a bunch of swore was haunted. We heard the rumor that some airman killed himself in the late 80's on the third floor. There were only 9 of us living in there for hot training in 2013. We all stayed on the second floor and the building had cameras in the halls. On the third floor we heard one of the showers running at night. Door was locked, cameras didn't show anyone coming or going. Heard other sounds as well, we would all be hanging out in the day room at times, and it sounded like others were in the building.
ME - Paul Harvey's (the 'Rest of the Story' Paul Harvey) son was SF back in the 60s. While guarding an alert B-52 in a snow storm, he froze to death in the wheel well waiting for relief from the cold. From then on, random bombers on the Alert Pad would have strange things happen, cockpit lights would come on, etc. That pad and the accompanying buildings are now the Airman Leadership School. While I haven't heard of anything happening there, it wouldn't surprise me if it did.
TW - Had a SP buddy who had been at FE Warren AFB. It dates back to an 1800’s cavalry fort. They had a building that was OLD then. (This was in the early 80s). Lights would go on and off you could pass by on patrol and one round the lights would be on and next round they would be off. It had been a medical quarantine for smallpox (and other diseases) where people had died back in the day. He said his K9 wouldn't go in the building. He said the CE guys would hear footsteps in the hallway and late at night hear muffled voices.
CH - OK, I heard this in Tech School at Biloxi back in 81. A tech wasn't paying attention to the fact that the safety pins that are pulled before flight for the ejection seat hadn't been installed After the last flight. Went to working on the plane anyway, hit the release handle and splatted himself to the roof of the hardstand. Heard he haunts the place as a warning not to do what he had done.
KSA - Okinawa as a whole is haunted. Our house on Shields was. And it wasn't anything huge. Just small things. Enough to make me think I was crazy. Started with a light in our stairs that went out. We changed it and then a month later it was out again. Because it was so high up, we didn't bother. But out of habit, we'd flip the switch when going up. Until one day it magically worked again. Didn't realize it until halfway up. Weird but whatever. Don't have to go borrow the ladder. Then my husband, who worked nights would tell me I left the house unlocked and the TV on when I went to bed. Ok. But I could have sworn I locked up after my last smoke and turned off the TV. Until one night I came in, locked up, watched a few minutes of TV, turned it off, walked down the hall to our stairs by the door and locked up again. Then the bed would shake. Not a lot. Just so you think there's a slight earthquake. But there's no notification. The cat isn't in the bed and it's just you. Again. Think I'm going crazy. Until my husband asks one day if there was an earthquake. Nope. But we joke there was a ghost. And the lights start to flicker. Stuff would go missing and then show up in random places. Our neighbors started their pcs process and their front light started going on and off. It continued to do so until weeks after they moved out and they got the house ready for someone else. On our last night in the house, we were cleaning for the inspection the next day and the light in our closet started flickering. Made a joke the ghost was upset and that the light was about to go out. The moment I said "out", it did. Our other neighbors also had some fun but I never really asked other than to joke about our mutual roomie.
ID - This is an odd one cause it's military related I think. But not from service. Years ago 14 or so now. I used to hang out with a bloke called Dodge. (An earned name due to a expansive past) Now dodge had some how been left responsible for an old old building. A big warehouse like structure. That was last used as an old pain factory. This place was strange from the get go. It had power but no bills. And no company new where the power was coming from. So none took responsibility. It was less then a mile from the fire station and they once needed them and they had no idea about this place. It's like it didn't exist. Something that stood out was a set of steps outside with a bricked up wall at the bottom. That in it's self isn't that big if a deal. What is a big deal is the fact the old iron rails around the steps remained. All of the old gates and fencing was taken for the war effort. Anyway, the wall is out through and we all enter. This place is wild. It's a flooded underground space. Not sure how to describe it. It had corrugated sheet on the bottom 3 feet of wall. And like rails for moving heavy stuff on a pulley around the room. The ceiling was multiple small arches. One wall caught out attention but we will get back to that. One thing that all but Dodge missed was the bricks. Since he had mostly left his past be in the past. He had become a building surveyor and he noticed the Bricks in the bunker were worth 10 times the bricks the warehouse was made of. This place was getting weirder and weirder. Back to the wall. How the arches met it didn't fit in with the rest of the structure. Didn't look right. It also had pipe work that protruded from it. So curiosity got the better of us so we drilled each wall. First three walls all the same. Brickwork, sand, brickwork, mud. But the wrong wall, the misfit was brickwork, sand, brickwork, sand, brickwork then the drill bit ran out of length. We never did get to the bottom of it. But I suggest we leave it alone given the rest of the goings on. Location, electric, remaining thick bars and so on. It was more than likely nasties were behind the wall. Anyway. We were down there once and my gf at the time was taking pictures and in one of them was this weird like white smoke shape of what I'd say was a dog. But the weirdest thing that happened to me down there was I was having a smoke and I'd finished and flicked the butt and it came back at me. With aggression. Got about 18 inches from me and fired back at me. The place was wild. Not sure why happened too it, or Dodge.
GA - I spent five years living on Kadena. I had more sleep paralysis instances than ever in my life - before and now after. I saw shady and static figures during these times. I am not one to believe in ghosts. One day they were doing excavations in Marek Park when I lived there and found a coffin shaped object in my front yard. The lead guy was on the phone for about two hours and then they re-buried it. The area I lived in was a HUGE burial ground.
These accounts of paranormal experiences among military personnel offer a fascinating intersection of the unexplained and the disciplined, shedding light on the depths of human perception and the mysteries that persist beyond our understanding. These encounters, often recounted with a mix of awe, skepticism, and reverence for the unknown, challenge conventional beliefs and provoke contemplation on the nature of reality itself. Whether interpreted as manifestations of psychological stress, glimpses into alternate dimensions, or encounters with forces beyond our comprehension, these stories underscore the resilience of the human spirit in the face of the inexplicable. As military personnel continue to navigate the complexities of their duties, their encounters with the paranormal serve as reminders of the vastness of the universe and the enduring quest for answers that lies at the heart of the human experience.
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