Diving For Ghosts

A friend who used to dive for bodies for the County somewhere in Minnesota told this story to me.

Mark was in his early twenties and a certified diver when a job opportunity came up with the Sheriff's department in a small Minnesota town to dive for bodies of people who went down in boating accidents.

Minnesota is full of lakes and rivers and water sports in the summer are very popular.

There had been an accident on a river and the divers were supposed to be searching for two men who went overboard while fishing. The police were parked on a bridge overlooking the river and the divers were in a boat just under the bridge. They were trained to use the buddy system and dive in pairs.

Well, Mark went into the water and down about 20 feet when he thought he saw the body of one of the men about 15 feet in front of him. He turned back to signal to his buddy who was facing the other way. When Mark turned back toward where he thought he saw the body, he noticed that the body was closer to him -- about 7 feet away -- and that it was NOT a man, but a woman with short dark hair wearing a flapper dress. Mark said her hands were flowing with the current and she seemed to be beckoning to him. This freaked Mark out and he turned toward his diving buddy again who signaled to Mark that he was going to the surface. Mark turned back toward the woman in the flapper dress to make sure she wasn't a figment of his imagination and she was a mere two feet from him, as though she swam towards him, and she was smiling at him. His logical mind told him that this was just a body. Maybe the reports were wrong and there were more than 2 men who had gone overboard, so he reached out his hand and firmly grabbed a hold of the woman's arm. He shot to the surface where he found his diving buddy having trouble with his breathing regulator and his own hand -- empty. Mark was embarrassed to mention seeing this woman to his buddy because he felt deep inside that she was otherworldly. Mark told his partner that he was not feeling well and was going in. His partner was having trouble with his equipment, so they both decided to go up on the bridge for a better view of the search. Mark's partner was inside the sheriff's van putting his equipment away and Mark was standing on the edge of the bridge looking at the remainder of the search team below when he heard an "aaahooooogaah" sound like the horn on an old Model T. He turned toward the sound where he saw a model T driven by the dark-haired woman in the flapper dress cross the bridge in front of him and disappear on the other side of the bridge. At this point, Mark became so terrified he ran toward the Sheriff's van and asked his partner if he saw the car and the woman. His partner told him that he hadn't seen her, but that the diving crew, as well as others had seen this woman before.

Apparently, the story goes that she was a mobster's girlfriend who knew too much and was literally given cement shoes and thrown off this bridge in the late 1920s.

According to Mark, he's had other experiences like this.