The Atlantic Paranormal Society
By Joy J. Fine
The Atlantic Paranormal Society, referred to often as TAPS, was begun by Jason Hawks and Grant Wilson in the early 1990s. It was originally called The Rhode Island Paranormal Society because of its location and nicknamed RIPS. When it first began it was no more than a group of people with a common interest in the paranormal who met weekly in coffee shops to discuss their mutual interest. The name was changed when they began investigating ghost sightings throughout the New England area instead of confining their activities to just Rhode Island. The group comes to investigate paranormal situations with the attitude that they are there to disprove a haunting. After their investigation they will tell those who called them whether there is real paranormal activity or not.
The Atlantic Paranormal Society does not charge anything to conduct an investigation though they will accept some monetary assistance with the costs of travel etc. They arrive with their instruments of investigation which usually include thermal cameras, electromagnetic field detectors, various cameras including video, digital and infrared as well as other bits and pieces to help them determine if there is indeed a haunting taking place. The team sent in will have between three and six people who will have the skills to determine in a period of no more than twelve hours what is really happening in the place they have been called to.
After being consultants for a television show a few years ago they were given their own reality show in 2004. The television program, Ghost Hunters, follows their crew as it investigates the paranormal trying to disprove, while sometimes proving, the cases they investigate. They no longer limit themselves to New England travelling throughout the Untied States on their assignments. Since the popularity of this show the Atlantic Paranormal Society now has it’s a website, a magazine and radio station. The website sells many souvenirs including t-shirts, bags, dog sweaters and onesies for your baby all emblazoned with either TAPS or the Ghost Hunters name. They have certainly come a long way from a group run by a couple of guys who worked at Roto-Router to support themselves as they investigated the paranormal.
During the first season of their reality show the Atlantic Paranormal Society claimed that only twenty five percent of their investigations were in fact linked to real hauntings. They are debunkers and so go out on these assignments with the goal to prove there is nothing there. This appears to make their report of an actual haunting more authentic. In the second season they claimed to have confirmed fifty one percent of the hauntings that they investigated as real. There are many skeptics out there who think that the investigations carried out by this group draw suspect conclusions, that they make the public look at one thing while using the fine art of distraction to make them see something else. Whatever you believe it seems it might be worth checking out their website to draw your own conclusions about what they claim to be doing.
