Episode Recap: Soul Searching

For the first time ever, the team looks for the soul of an old friend when they investigate the Belcourt Castle in Newport Rhode Island. The team investigated the castle 10 years ago, yet they are eager to be back this time with more sophisticated equipment and strategies for the hunt. Belcourt Castle was built between 1891 and 1894 as a summer residence. In 1956 the Tinney family purchased the house and opened it up to the public in 1957. Since Mr. Tinney's death in 2006, the caretaker, Mrs. Tinney and workers of the castle have all made reports of unique paranormal experiences on the property. Mrs. Tinney and the caretaker saw a ball of light appear above the crown on the gold coronation coach. In the chapel area, a German wood carving of a monk is said to emit eerie energy and cause unexplainable occurrences in its presence. While giving a tour, one of the employees and her tour group noticed that an empty suit of armor turned its head.

To begin the hunt, Jason and Grant head into the banquet hall. They hear walking upstairs and go up to the second floor hallway to investigate. They then notice that they were receiving interesting hits on their K2 meter. And by using their thermal imaging camera, they also find a suspicious heat signature on the floor. After examining the heat signature further they deduced that it was a footstep and that it was picking up speed as it moved away from them.

Meanwhile Amy and Kris conducted their investigation in the ballroom where Mr. Tinney's funeral was held. Some people made reports that they saw him standing on the balcony above looking down on them. During their EVP session, the investigators heard footsteps that they thought were coming from the spiral staircase but they could find no cause for these mysterious noises.

In the ballroom Dave and Steve investigated the wooden monk carving that allegedly evokes paranormal activity. Yet after conducting an EVP session in the room, neither ghost hunter was able to make any significant findings.

While finishing up their session on the second floor Jason and Grant heard footsteps near the bedroom. Yet they didn't get any response on their K2 meter while they were investigating together. On a whim, Jason asks Grant to leave he and the entity alone so that he can conduct a private EVP session with the paranormal. He instructs the spirit to light up the K2 meter if it wanted to be left alone. In response to this, the meter began to light up significantly, then Jay obeyed the entity's request and left the room.

In addition to all of the evidence the ghost hunters were able to find during their investigation, they also unearthed very interesting voices on their digital recorders. While Kris and Amy were in the ballroom, they left a recorder near the suit of armor, and the recorder picked up what appeared to be humming or moaning noises. Another of Kris and Amy's recorders also picked up a voice in the banquet hall area that replied, "yes" when they asked if the things in the room belonged to it. After a thorough investigation and a gathering of concrete evidence, TAPS confirmed that the Belcourt Castle is definitely filled with paranormal activity.

Sacco's Bowl Haven, Massachusetts

The team goes to investigate Sacco's Bowl Haven to see if there is any truth to the claims of the supernatural made by the employees. The building has been in the Sacco family since 1939 and since that time, it's gained a reputation for being haunted. An employee who used to work at the service desk quit because he thought he felt breathing on his neck. And the spirit of a former elderly employee is believed to roam the maintenance room where he used to sleep. Most eerily is that the bowling balls often come back from the ball return area, even when the machines are turned off.

To kick off the investigation, Jason and Grant conduct an EVP session in the pool area. They try to reenact a scene that might provoke the spirit, so they begin to play a game of pool while asking entity a series of questions. During their game, the K2 meter received a couple of sporadic hits but nothing that seemed conclusive. They receive similar results when they investigate the bowling area. While reenacting a bowling game, the K2 meter lit up a couple of times, but there was no context to the machine's responses. Then when Jason turns off the bowling machine, both hunters notice that a couple of balls continued to come down the return. And upon further analysis they find that this was caused by a default in the machine's mechanism and not a paranormal.

Later Dave and Steve take an EMF reading of the desk area. Their detector receives an extreme response near the electrical box behind the desk. This leads them to the conclusion that the employee standing there was probably hypersensitive to the electromagnetic fields, and this was in turn causing temporary hallucinations that made the employee believe the was encountering a paranormal, when in reality he was not.

In the maintenance area, Jay and Grant realize that the toilet in the back has a leaky flap, which causes the tank to fill, making water noises that might sound like heavy breathing to someone standing near the door, without view of the toilet. Then Kris and Amy are able to debunk that the noises in the bowling alley are most likely attributed to the old machinery, which people might mistake as noises caused by paranormals.

Since the team was able to debunk nearly all of their encounters throughout their investigation at the Sacco bowling alley, they decide that more than likely, there is no paranormal activity in this building.