As Halloween creeps closer, skeletons, witches and ghosts decorate yards and homes in neighborhoods from coast to coast, but some thrill-seekers would be happier for a real-life haunted encounter. If seeing a ghost would be your ultimate spooky season experience, you may want to head to New York. According to a frightening new study, it’s the most haunted state in the country.
- Researchers with Casino.ca pinned down the most common spots for phantom sightings by analyzing over 1.8-million “Ghosts of America” records - a series of books and websites for paranormal stories - for the last 100 years. They also scoured social media to find reports of spirit encounters.
- They discovered that nearly one in four Americans have claimed to see a ghost over the past century, with 1.84-million encounters recorded nationwide.
- That’s about 2,329 ghost sightings per 10-thousand people.
- That’s a 23.29% chance of running into a spirit, higher odds than you’d probably expect.
- But we can’t be everywhere in the country at once, so the investigators broke it down by states to reveal the ones with the most reported sightings.
- They found New York is the ghostly hotspot, with 81 sightings per 10-thousand people.
- On the flip side, Georgia is the least haunted, with just 6 sightings per 10-thousand people.
The States with the Most Ghost Sightings
- New York (81 per 10-thousand people)
- Texas (77 per 10-thousand people)
- Louisiana (74 per 10-thousand people)
- California (72 per 10-thousand people)
- Utah (65 per 10-thousand people)
- Florida (64 per 10-thousand people)
- Pennsylvania (62 per 10-thousand people)
- Alabama (61 per 10-thousand people)
- Nevada (60 per 10-thousand people)
- Washington (57 per 10-thousand people)
Source: Casino.ca⠀