Featured Image Credit: YouTube/Dara Tah
Topics: Weird, YouTube, World News, History
Olivia Burke
A bloke who bravely spent the night on the 'world's most haunted island', which was home to a notorious asylum, has revealed what he encountered during his spooky stay.
YouTuber Dara Tah doesn't scare easily, as he's visited the one of the 'deadliest' spots in the world without even breaking a sweat - but even he was unnerved while getting his head down on Poveglia Island with his pal.
The Irishman made the daring journey to the infamous island, situated between Venice and Lido, with his friend and fellow content creator Matt James, back in January.
Excursions to the place are prohibited, but as these two proved, when there's a will, there's a way.
Advert
Dara - who says he is 'on a mission to have the craziest life possible' - explained that the police have banned any visitors to the island.
And seen as though Poveglia was a 'black plague isolation zone' where a reported 160,000 people were sent 'to die', you can understand why authorities reckon it's best left alone.
That's without even mentioning the eeriness of the remaining buildings which served as an asylum for the mentally ill from the early 1920s - and according to Dara, some pretty terrifying stuff went down there.
The thrillseeker told his 537,000 subscribers: "The doctors conducted terrible experiments on their patients away from the eyes of the public.
Advert
"The last people to own the island fled during their first night staying on it when their daughter was mysteriously attacked by something...that was 70 years ago. And no one has attempted to stay on it since. Until now."
Dara explained that the entire point of their trip to Poveglia was to reach the Bell Tower, which is said to be the most haunted spot on the entire island.
The duo were armed with an array of ghost hunting gear for their visit, including night vision and motion-sensor cameras, as well as a 'Spirit Box' to pick up any strange frequencies and a thermal gun to track heat sources.
"If ghosts exist, I'm going to find them," Dara said.
Advert
The pair vlogged their journey as they made their way through a dense forest in pursuit of the Bell Tower, as they pointed out that the island was an 'absolute labyrinth' where they could 'get lost super easy'.
Dara showed how they stumbled across an array of dilapidated buildings, including what were formerly the staff quarters and a doctor's wing of the asylum.
"All I know is, this place is meant to be a death trap - it is completely overgrown," he told viewers. "This entire building could like collapse at any moment. We need to be super super careful with our steps."
The daylight faded a lot faster than they would have liked, but they eventually reached the entrance to the asylum - and the first thing they noticed was a 'funny smell'.
"It looks imposing and scary, I'm not going to lie," Dara said. "You ready to enter hell? We now need to start planting the first cameras. I'm getting the sense that like just anything could be around the corner.
Advert
"Every step I'm taking feels dangerous."
The lads set up their equipment before Matt set off for a nosy round - while Dara, who stayed behind, was left quite alarmed when all of his high-tech ghost hunting gear suddenly stopped working.
When his pal eventually returned, they whipped out their heat detector to try and tail a ghost.
"There's like a trail of heat, let's follow this," Dara said. "Wow that is freaky as hell man there is literally a bit of a heat signature following along the wall, oh man...where is it taking us?"
Advert
As the YouTubers made their way down a number of scary passageways, they realised they were being led right to the Bell Tower.
"They say that the bell tower is the most haunted part and weirdly the heat gun brought us right to it," Dara explained. "I don't know how to explain that."
The lads then grabbed their Spirit Box to see what they could pick up.
For the uninitiated, Spirit Boxes scan through multiple different radio stations very quickly. Ghost hunters reckon they can capture messages from spirits. Paranormal investigators ask questions and, allegedly, the spirits respond in full sentences rather than the standard garbled radio noise.
Dara and Matt heard an array of songs from theirs, as well as some sentences which were spoken in Italian.
But as neither of them speak the language, they were forced to simply go to sleep and wait until morning when their Italian friend, Manu, could translate it.
Thankfully, the night was pretty uneventful and they survived it - which is a pretty mean feat, seen as though no one has dared to doze off there in more than 70 years.
The pair were laughing as they hopped on their boat and back to civilisation, but their mood soon changed when Manu revealed what the words they had heard via the Spirit Box meant.
"Incident is incident," Manu said. "Partire means uh, leave, travel. Scoppiato - This is real? Scoppiato means exploded.
"They're very alarming words. Straight up. I won't even fake that. Something was there with them and it was Italian - they did not want them to be there. It was not happy. The words are alarming. They're strong words."
Still, Dara remained unconvinced that ghosts might have been keeping him and Matt company.
However, there was a series of events which he says are 'very difficult to explain' which took place after they left.
Dara explained he noticed 'red scratches and blotches all over his hands' which he had no idea where they had come from, while poor Manu 'was literally stopped in the airport and his bag was searched for...explosives'.
Coincidence? I think not.
But after scouring through the hours of footage he recorded throughout the night at Poveglia, he found 'absolutely nothing' - and his beliefs about the paranormal so far remain unchanged.