Your True Tales
November 2007 - Page 18
Aircraft Museum Ghost
by Stuart Cunningham
I would like to tell you about an experience I had back in November, 2003. I was a product manager for a large multi-national electronics company back then and had to spend a lot of my time out on the road. Due to my interest in old aircraft, my father being in the Royal Airforce during WW2 and my previous job for 27 years as an engineer working on Aircraft Systems for one of the UK's top electronic companies.
When I found myself in the area of the northeast of England I liked to visit Sunderland Aircraft Museum, This museum is situated on the site of the WW2 RAF base of Unsworth, which is now mostly taken up with the large Nissan car plant. I had been told previously of some strange goings on in the museum, and on that occasion brought with me a laser thermometer.
I arrived that day at about 4.30 in the afternoon. As it was November, it was just starting to get dark, exchanging small talk with the attendant at the desk I wandered into the purpose built exhibition hanger, going up to the far end of the hanger and next to an Hawker Hunter and not far from a Westland Helicopter that was on display. (I had measured the air temperature of the hanger as 12 degrees C. and the general floor temperature at 10 degrees C.). However, it was when I reached a spot in between these two aircraft that my temperature readings dropped drastically. I now found it dropping very fast to 1 degree C., and at this time found I could now see my breath. When I moved away from that spot the readings returned up to the normal 10 degrees C.
When informed of this odd occurrence, the attendant just shrugged and gave me a knowing look. However, my experience was not over. When I left the building to return to my car parked in the car park, a dark shadow rushed across my path from right to left causing me to stop in my tracks. Proceeding to my car (the only one in the car park) I got in. It was then I heard the sound of what seemed like gravel being thrown up under the car; the sound lasting for almost two seconds. (Later on I checked and there was no evidence of any gravel in the area I had parked.)
Driving out of the car park, I headed for my hotel, which I had booked the previous week. This hotel was a relatively new hotel, being only built five years previous and situated in South Shields at the Mouth of the river Tyne about six miles from Sunderland. It is a good hotel which I had used many times previously and as such they would, when possible, upgrade me to a superior room.
It was in one of these rooms that my experience continued, it was now about 6.30 p.m. and I was lying on the bed watching the local news on the television, the TV being situated on a table near the foot of my bed, when a dark shadow materialized about three feet to the right of the television. I would say it was nearly three feet in height, very dark with no features and had the outline shape similar to a small child. When I turned and looked directly at it, it did what I can only describe as "imploded" - it broke up into hand-sized parts dissolving into itself, taking about two seconds to complete.
I sat up bolt straight in the bed and asked myself did I just see what I had just seen? Unfortunately, my answer was yes. Nothing out of the ordinary happened further that night, so first thing after breakfast I traveled back to the Sunderland Aircraft Museum, just in case I had picked up an unwanted hitchhiker who wanted to return to its place of residence. I have returned to the museum several times in later years and not seen anything further. However, just last year (2006) the museum was the subject of the UK's television program "Most Haunted". I would be interested in any comments or theories on my experience.
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