Ghost Hunting Team investigates Rhode Island

Though the Halloween season may be over, The University of Rhode Island Ghost Hunting Team continues to offer students an eerie experience, leading members through investigations of paranormal activities around the Rhode Island area.

URI’s Ghost Hunting Team, referred to as URIGHT, has accumulated some interesting stories over the years. Corina Perugini, a senior communication disorders and psychology double major, explained that the club does not do investigations in ways some people may expect.

“We like to look at things with a logical, scientific approach; investigating to see if something can be explained scientifically or if it could be something else,” Perugini said. “All that hyped up stuff you see on TV isn’t real. That’s not really what investigations are like. You have to remain calm and let things happen on their own.”

Perugini has been a member of URIGHT since her freshman year, and has become the Treasurer on the executive board. She said she was drawn in early on in her academic career and has always loved how interesting of an experience the club has been, although she said it is not for everybody.

“I went into it with an open mind,” Perugini said. “This isn’t something you can go into expecting to see something right away. Everybody wants something out of it, but it doesn’t always happen right away.”

The club, obtaining legal permission for each investigation, goes to different locations during the night and does investigations. These locations include cemeteries, old buildings and even classrooms, such as rooms in URI’s own East Hall.

“Sometimes we will think we hear footsteps, so we will check in with all the other groups to see if they were on that floor making the noise,” Perugini explained. “Once we know their location, we can investigate further.” She said that this actually happened in East Hall once. The team heard footsteps on the floor above them but nobody was up there.

“It’s cool because you do these investigations, and then you remember that students have class in here everyday,” Perugini said.

One of the club’s members, Ryan Wallace, a sophomore computer science major, shared a different experience about East Hall.

While doing an investigation in East Hall last year, Wallace, as well as other members of URIGHT, were in the presences of a paranormal figure. He described that while sitting in the corner on the third floor of the building, one of the members of the club, Paulie, claimed to have seen a face. After doing some additional scans with some of their equipment, they found a presence in the shape of a person. Trying to get validation from other members, they brought them upstairs to see but the figure was gone. When Wallace, as well as another member, Emma, turned around, they saw a face in the glass of an office door. Wallace described the face as washed out, with a blank stare and angry eyes, later finding out that this was the same face Paulie had seen earlier in the investigation. Wallace described that the story got even creepier.

“Later on in the night, we were sitting in a hallway doing another reading, and we heard somebody yell ‘Paulie!’” Wallace said. “At first we thought it was the other group looking for us, so we went upstairs to ask them. When we got there, the other part of our group said they had thought we were calling them.“

Wallace was able to capture all this evidence in an audio recording, and now has added this evidence to the club’s collection.

URIGHT continues to investigate both on and off campus and is always open to new members. The club meets every Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. in room 308 of the Memorial Union.