Ghost hunter talks about his craft at Fort program

FORT RECOVERY - He's an insurance sales manager by day, paranormal investigator by night.

Alex Meiring, a Fort Recovery native who lives in Columbus with his wife, Krista, is a member of Dark Alley Paranormal Investigators. The ghost hunting team has four locations in the U.S., including one in Columbus.

Meiring, a 2003 Fort Recovery graduate, has investigated haunted mansions, abandoned insane asylums and a decrepit tuberculosis hospital over the past five years. But he was scared of only one thing during his Tuesday night talk at the Fort Recovery Public Library.

"My grandma is here today so I'm very glad none of my audio has me cussing in it," Meiring said, drawing a laugh from the packed room.

Meiring explained the process involved in a ghost hunt. When Dark Alleys decides to investigate a location with paranormal activity, a case manager plans the mechanics of the investigation and looks into the site's history, he said.

The team then enters a location and spends hours looking for paranormal activity. Investigations can take place during the day but are typically completed at night, Meiring said, because it is easier to capture movement on infrared cameras.

Notable ghost hunt locations Meiring shared with the crowd were Waverly Hills in Louisville, Ky.; Pennhurst State School and Hospital in East Vincent, Pa.; and Bears Mill in Greenville.

While at Waverly Hills, an old tuberculosis hospital that averaged a death per hour during its peak, Meiring walked alone in a pitch black tunnel that was used as a body chute to usher caskets outside the hospital out of the sight of other patients. The investigation took place while Meiring was on the Travel Channel show "Paranormal Challenge" and he was able to show the audience a video of him in the tunnel, where loud banging noises caused Meiring to unleash a few censored words.

Meiring also played Dark Alley audio files for the spellbound crowd. Words and phrases such as "run," "I did it today" and "help" have been captured on tape, Meiring said as the files played.

For the paranormal novices in the room, he explained the activity comes in two types: residual and intelligent. Residual, he said, is trapped energy performing repetitive actions.

"Intelligent activity is when they interact with us," Meiring explained.

The team uses digital voice recorders, cameras equipped with infrared light, flashlights and motion detectors to capture such activity, he said.

"When you hear that motion detector go off when you're all alone in a dark room, that's creepy," Meiring said.

Aside from asking spirits simple questions, Meiring said the team tries not to rile angry spirits.

"We try to be respectful," Meiring said. "And we hope they are in turn respectful to us."

One of the more active places Meiring has investigated is the Fort Recovery opera house. He said during the investigation, a woman's voice could be heard and flashlights turned on and off. Allegedly, the opera house is haunted by a woman named Myrtle.

Meiring believes in what he does despite his skeptics' doubts.

"Spirits were once people, too," he said. "We're just trying to get answers."

To keep up with the Dark Alley team, visit darkalleyparanormal.com. The group can also be found on Facebook and Twitter.