Unnamed Narrator (10:15)

Before I start, I just want to mention that my English isn't the best. All I ask for is for you to bear with me at the time I'm writing this. It's been four months since this happened. It might not be as scary as the other ones, but to be as young as I was then, it was completely terrifying, to say the very least, and it left me with some serious ptsd. Every year, my family and I would travel to different areas around the US for my sister's cheer competitions. This time we went to Dallas, Texas for the NCA Nationals, which was supposed to be the biggest competition of the year. It was our first time there, so my sister was very excited. My dad lived there for a certain period and it was a bit of nostalgia overload for him, but for me, my sis, and my mom, it was our first time. We're from the Northeast, so we were pretty far away from our hometown. We spent the first two days exploring the city and participating in some festivities. The four of us were just having such a great time. Then the first day of the competition rolled around and the four of us spent most of our day in the convention center in downtown Dallas. There were people everywhere for such a small convention center Compared to the ones we've been to in the past, there were almost three times the amount of people there. This is important for later. Anyways, my sister didn't compete until about 4:30 in the afternoon. So we spent the majority of our time in one of the exhibition halls for some context of the layout as this will also be very vital info for later. There are five exhibition halls, each adjacent to one another. After the last hall, there is a bridge that leads to an adjacent Omni Hotel. We were in the fourth hall from that bridge and the second one from an arena where the big teams performed. Anyways, when noon rolled around, my family and I went outside for a bath. A group picture with the entire cheer team. Then one o' clock rolls around and some of my sister's teammates went to the team rooms which was near the bridge as it was getting close to their performance time. We had three hours though, so we went back to the hall we were in before to watch more teams and eat some snacks. Now comes the part where things get weird. As we were sitting in the bleachers, my dad happened to notice a strange looking man speed walking up the bleachers and sat at the very top. He looked worried. Dad pointed him out to us. But to be honest, at that time I wasn't really concerned. In order to even get into these exhibition halls, you need a special wristband proving you're either an athlete or a family member. About five or so minutes later, while one team was performing, everyone heard screams and then the crowd of people started running towards the exit. The announcer yelled stop the routine. Stop the routine. And the athletes on the stage started running off the stage too. We were confused at first until the same man that we saw earlier yelled shooter. My heart dropped, but before I could even process what he said, my family grabbed me and we all ran towards the exit, which was thankfully only a few feet away from where we sat. When we got outside, we saw about 400 confused and frightened families wondering what was happening. No one was absolutely sure if there was a shooter or not. At this point, my family and I hid behind a set of tractors for cover, just in case. Less than a minute later, everyone sees another crowd of people running from the arena, which is in the opposite direction from where the first group ran, and they were shouting, he's behind us. Run. Once again, everyone started running, this time in the direction of the parking lot. As we ran, I heard two distinct pops, which we all still firmly believe are two gunshots. We ran even faster until we got to the train tracks. Which we had to climb over. Everyone was helping one another get across, including my dad, who helped a poor athlete with casts on her legs cross over. We entered the parking lot and were met with some welcoming sights of police vehicles and medical personnel. We just stayed in that lot watching other families get reunited with their family members, as well as people calling for them. It felt so sad watching all of this happen, but it felt even worse as by that point we were all sure of what was happening. We were in the midst of a mass shooting, and with the amount of people in this crowded convention center, a fraction could have easily been killed already. People of all ages were here and their lives could have been cut tragically short. Experiencing a mass shooting has always been one of my greatest fears. And now it was actually happening to me. Far from home, in a place I'd never been before. I thought of my friends, our cab back home, what would happen to her, we all thought. There were multiple gunshots as well as running several different directions. My family just huddled and hugged tightly. My parents kept reiterating that everything would be okay and that hopefully we were safe now. We were not. Another set of crowd of people started running towards us, yelling at everyone to do the same. Once again, we all ran outside of the parking lot and away from the convention center. We were no longer in its vicinity. Everyone started walking again past confused bystanders who were asking if we were okay and if there was a shooting. The crowd split up and my family and I, along with a couple others, walked until we arrived at a crosswalk about two streets away from the convention center. We all just stood there watching as thousands of police vehicles sped past us. Everyone was consoling one another and some were still calling for their family members. I later learned that at that point, my sister's teammates were still inside and had barricaded themselves inside of the team room. After a while, my dad suggested that we started walking back towards the convention center. We walked past other oblivious cheer families who were walking towards the convention center while glancing at us. I wanted to scream so bad at them to turn back, but at that point, we just wanted to make it back into the safety of our hotel. When we got inside, we went inside a room where the rest of my sister's gem was gathered. My sister hugged her friends and my parents left the room to get water. I just sat in the corner, still hyperventilating and trying to decompress. I just wanted to go back home. We all did. The hotel staff was so kind to us and brought us water and Pizza boxes. The gym staff handled everything so well, and I really do appreciate that. After a while, my parents and I sat with some other parents and talked about the incident. We learned that some of the adults at our gym were injured, and one poor mom broke some of her teeth when being trampled. We were all so scared, but also glad as we were in the safest place we could possibly be. During that time, my family and I went back to our room and turned on the tv, where we learned that this incident was already on the news. They said something that many people, myself included, are still pretty pissed about. They said there was no shooter. The police searched the building and didn't find one. The gunshots were mistaken for poles falling on the ground inside. But how does that explain what we heard outside? They also said that the commotion started because of two cheer dads throwing hands with each other. For some godforsaken reason, this apparently made poles falling nearby. While a video of the fight came out later that day, no poles were seen. And how does that simple fight cause people to run for their lives? I did learn that one of the dads had a gun on their waistband. If you're wondering about the suspicious man from earlier, I have no idea who he was or what happened to him, but I do believe he was involved in that fight in some way. The scariest thing was some young athletes were still missing. The reunification spot was set up, and even then some didn't show. Thankfully, they were found. The competition was cancelled for the rest of that day, but it continued the following day. Some teams rightfully didn't attend, and the ones who did, my sisters included, were on edge the entire time, thinking something could happen again, but nothing ever did. My sister only competed for one day, and the size of her division was halved. Ten people sustained injuries that day, but none were gun related, as far as I know. As of now, there haven't been many updates of this incident. We have no idea what happened to those dads or if there was a shooter or not. But anyone who was there is certain that there was one. No simple fight causes a catastrophe like that. My family and I are sure of the pops that we heard outside, and we will die on the hill. Some of the anger was geared towards the convention center, as they didn't have much security. If they did, this whole thing probably wouldn't have even happened. This whole incident ruined the rest of the trip for my family and I. We left Dallas after the competition ended, and we hope we never return. I'm sure everyone who was there and their families and friends who weren't are extremely glad that we came out alive. But there is still a looming dread in all of us for what could have been. If there was a shooter, a lot of people would have died. This might not be as scary as other ones covered on this topic, but it left many people, including myself, with emotional scars. I still suffer from PTSD and flinch every time I hear a loud bang or screams. Sadly, I don't think it will ever go away.

Southern Cannibal (21:52)

In 2017 my sister and I flew down to New Orleans from Ohio for a convention. It was our first time ever in New Orleans, first time ever on a plane, and the show that we were going to the convention for was our favorite.

Unnamed Narrator (22:07)

So.

Southern Cannibal (22:07)

So we were absolutely stoked for the entire experience. We were going to see our favorite actors in person and I got to see for myself the beautiful houses that Anne Rice had so eloquently described in her Mayfair Witch trilogy. Our stepdad warned us to be very careful in New Orleans. He's a deputy sheriff, so I suppose you can't really blame him. So we stayed on our guard. Or at least my sister did for me and herself on one of the days after I did for us on another day. Because one of the first days we were there I decided that I wanted to try a famous hurricane drink and walk the famous Bourbon street to see the sights I don't usually drink and the good sir that made my hurricane at one of the walk up bars seemed to have used a shot of every type of alcohol to exist. So I was heavily buzzed. So my 21 year old sister had to babysit 27 year old me. We were admiring a band playing when suddenly a man with dreads walked up to us and said hey, have I seen you here before? Drunk me giggled because I was an idiot and my self awareness meter was at about 10% working capacity while my sister just cautiously told him no while taking a step back to analyze the guy's next move. Then the guy said oh, I know what it is. I've seen you in my dreams. Be free dreams. And he took off. Not so scary, but I thought it would be fun to add. The scary part is we had to use Uber to get from our hotel to the convention center one night when the convention's activities were over for that day we had ordered an Uber. The Uber driver was supposed to be a woman named Samantha or something like that. When our ride showed up it was a man and the car reeked of marijuana. My sister hopped in and I followed suit Asking if this was Uber. The man said yes and confirmed our destination before taking off. All the while I was looking at the app totally confused, looking at Samantha's picture and knowing that this driver was definitely not Samantha. Wide eyed, I tried to give my sister a um, we might be in trouble kind of look. But it was now her turn to be completely oblivious on this trip so I had to text her. I sent her a text saying driver is supposed to be a girl named Samantha and I'm not liking this weed smell. Be on alert in case we have to do something. My sister didn't look at her phone. She didn't even check it or know that I texted her. So I said hey sis, did you text Katie to let her know that we were on the way back? It was just me and my sister, but I was hoping she'd get the hint to look at her phone. I was also hoping it would alert the guy driving that there was someone expecting us, even though that it was a complete lie. When my sister gave me a look that said that she had no idea what I was talking about, I said I really think you should text Katie to let her know that we're on our way. I otherwise she might start to worry I don't have her number so you have to do it. My sister finally got the hint and when she read my text her expression went flat. She looked at me and I returned her gaze with a be ready type of look. Thankfully this man had actually dropped us off at our hotel. I'm pretty sure that Uber does not allow other people to use someone else's driver's account for this very reason. I'd hate to think what would have happened if it was just some random guy picking us up, when in reality it must have been someone who Samantha knows. I never used Uber before that point, so I'm not really sure what proper procedures are for it. Anyway, I'm glad that I was able to think quickly in that situation, even though it led to nothing dangerous. Be safe everyone. So the story happened to me in the summer of 2024 and to this day I still don't know the explanation. I went on vacation with my family, all of my cousins, their parents and my grandma. We were basically four families traveling together. This happened on the third or fourth night of the trip. We were staying at a hotel we go to almost every year. One night I was really tired from all the beach activities, so I decided to go to bed around 12am, which is a bit early for me. I slept like a baby until around 2am, which was really weird because I didn't feel thirsty or need to use the bathroom. Instead, I woke up to the sound of the door opening. Keep in mind, it was a suite, so there were two rooms. One for my sister and parents, a bathroom and a small living room where my bed was. My bed was facing the front door. Normally I sleep with the back of my head toward the door every year, but for some reason this year I decided to sleep facing the door. When I woke up to the sound of it opening, I saw the shadow of someone standing there. It's like the moment they saw me, they shut the door again. I was a bit confused, but I assumed it was my cousins because I could hear kids on the stairs outside the room. I didn't think much of it. I grabbed my phone from the table beside me to check the time and and it was exactly 2am I was still really tired, so I just went back to sleep within seconds. The next morning, the first thing I remembered was what I saw during the night. While eating breakfast with my cousins. I told them about how someone had opened our door. I mentioned that I thought it was them, but weirdly, they all said that they had been asleep at that time and they didn't believe me at first. But if they were all sleeping, then who the hell opened our hotel room door and how did they do it without a key? We're always sure to lock the door every night. Also, there's a motion sensor light in front of the hotel rooms that automatically turns on when someone stands beneath it. When the shadow person opened the door, the light was on, so that's proof I wasn't dreaming I was fully awake. I kept calling it a shadow person because I didn't see their face. They appeared as a black silhouette since the sensor light was behind them, casting them in shadow. At first, my cousins didn't believe me until my aunt said that she believed me because something similar happened to her on the same night. She and her husband had woken up in the middle of the night sweating because the air conditioner was off. When they got up to turn it back on, they had noticed their front door was wide open and the door to the other room was open too. They even heard the sound of the air conditioner running even though it was supposedly off. We decided to check the cameras in front of the rooms. We didn't see anyone or the shadow figure, but we did see the sensor light flickering. All of this kind of makes me believe it was something paranormal, but weirdly enough, I wasn't Scared or even spooked. Even though I was only 15 at the time, I still to this day have no idea what it actually was. And I guess I never will. My name is Harry and I live in the uk. A couple of years ago, my family and I went on holiday to a little island just off the coast of the uk. The island is called the Isle of Wight and it's a quite popular vacation spot. Anyway, we were staying for two weeks and at the time, my brother and I didn't want to go on vacation. We wanted to stay at home and hang out with our friends. We were roughly 13 or 14 years old at the time. My parents wouldn't allow us to stay home though, so we came to a compromise. They let us have mobile data so we could text our friends. However, when we arrived on holiday, we realized that the place we were staying in didn't even have wifi. We soon figured out that it also had a very weak phone signal. So we decided to wander around the town of the Isle of Wight to try and find a strong connection so we could still get online. We eventually found a very sketchy corner of a street that had a decent signal, so we stayed there. All was going well until we heard music coming from an old radio. Creepy clown music was playing and it was getting gradually closer. We stayed put and then two minutes later, a guy dressed in a clown costume with a stitched up mouth that looked like a smile cycled past us along with the radio, sitting in the basket on the front of his bicycle. I know how this all sounds, but we were creeped the hell out. But soon we forgot about it. About 10 minutes later, my brother said, can you see that? He was pointing at the guy in the clown costume who was gradually making his way toward us from about a hundred yards away. Very subtly. As he got closer and closer, my brother and I both decided to book it. We ran to the top of the hill, hoping we were just overthinking the whole situation, but to our horror, he was now standing at the end of the street where we had just been sitting, doing the loudest, creepiest clown type laugh possible. We totally freaked out and just started running. We decided to get home as quickly as possible and took a sketchy shortcut. However, about 10 minutes into the shortcut, we heard the creepy clown music playing behind us again. We ran as fast as we could the rest of the way home. We got home in tears, scared for our lives, but we didn't see him again for the rest of the evening. However, that night, around 1am we heard that same clown music outside our window again. We peeked outside into the back garden to see if we were just hearing things. To our horror, the guy in the clown costume was standing in our back garden holding the radio, laughing and pointing at us. The police were called when they came to search. They found nothing. Luckily though, we didn't see him again for the rest of our vacation and we never went back to that sketchy part of town. Hello, my name is Summer this is a true frightening story that happened to my friends Barry, Roger and me on our summer vacation in California in July 2010. Moscuba diving the story has a strong warning because it has frightening moments and violence in it. So please skip if you're scared or squeamish of these types of things. Thank you. Plus for privacy reasons, I will only use people's first names in the story. My friend Roger was a good looking young man with short brown hair and a close cropped brown beard. He had a slender but athletic build. Roger had a great sense of humor that always kept us laughing. My boyfriend Barry was a nice looking African American man with ebony skin. He had a professional bodybuilder's build and wanted to be a pro bodybuilder in the future. As for me, Summer, I had big blue eyes and long blonde hair with a curvy figure. I wanted to be a swimsuit model and I was lucky enough to pose for some swimsuit magazines already. Barry, Roger and myself all liked to work out in the gym. We were all 19 years old and attended a fine California university together. We friends were also part of the Sea Otter Scuba Diving Club. The club had many members, but Barry and Roger were my closest friends. We all loved to explore the Pacific Ocean marine life, which we thought was some of the most beautiful marine life in the world. This Pacific Ocean marine life included sea anemones, sea turtles, sea otter, giant sunfish, giant oceanic manta rays, dolphins, killer whales sometimes called orcas, humpback, gray and blue whales, and a variety of shark species. School was out for the summer so Roger, Beary and I decided to enjoy our summer vacation in California. We decided to go spearfishing and hunt for the Goliath grouper. The Goliath grouper is a trophy fish that can grow six to eight feet and weigh up to 800 pounds. Barry, Roger and I decided to take one of our Sea Otter Club diving boats for this adventure. Our friend Roger would stay on the boat while my boyfriend Barry and I would hunt for the Goliath grouper. We would have to be careful because the Goliath grouper we would be hunting could be found near the Farallon Islands. The Farallon Islands is where a rookery of California seal and sea lions lived and had their nests. These seals have orca and great white sharks preying on them, two top predators. So we would have to be very careful and give them their space. Orcas were not known to attack people in the wild, but great white sharks were. Orca females were around 23ft and the males were 30ft plus. Even though great whites can grow 23ft, the size was rare. Most male white sharks were around 11 to 13ft while the female white sharks were 15 to 16ft. However, some tooth marks were found in an Australian whale carcass that suggest that some white sharks could grow 25 to 26ft, which is a very scary thought. Like Robert Shaw's character Quint in the movie Joel said, this shark can swallow you whole. Indeed it could. A well documented true shark attack like this was in La Jolla, California in 1959 where free diver Robert Pamperin was swallowed whole by a gray white about 20ft long. His pal could do nothing to save him since he had no weapon to fight the shark with. Myself, I have photos and shark attack books of a few scuba divers dead on a slab in their wetsuit with one leg severed off. Probably a great white shark if I had to guess. The three most dangerous sharks to watch out for are the great white shark, tiger and bull shark. The great hammerhead and mako shark are dangerous too. And they come next. The Farallon Islands was called the Devil's Teeth because of the treacherous underwater shoals in their vicinity. The islands are 30 miles outside of the Golden Gate and 20 miles south of Point Reyes and are visible to the mainland on clear days. The Faroean Islands are part of the city and county of San Francisco. The only inhabitants that are humans on the place are located on the Southeast Fairland island where researchers from Point Blue, Conservation Science and the U.S. fish and Wildlife Service stay. These islands are closed to the public, rightly so. With all of the dangerous marine life there, there should be no swimming, water skiing or even scuba diving there. Even though some people scuba dive near there. Roger Berry and I loved our boat. We were on. It was a 40 foot craft with a kitchen and rooms. Roger had his own room and Barry and I shared a room. We even had a phone to get in contact with other boats in the mainland in case of emergency. When we were close to the diving spot, Roger had stopped the boat while Barry and I got into our black wetsuits and grabbed our spearguns. Barry and I would only be gone an hour at most since we only had an hour of oxygen in our tanks. When we were ready, Barry and I gave our friend Roger the thumbs up sign as we dove backwards into the Pacific Ocean, Barry and I planned to be safe and hunt for the Goliath grouper together with Roger on the boat in close proximity. Within half an hour, I saw Barry bop his head out of the water and signal to me that he saw a large pink Goliath grouper. Pink Goliath groupers were pretty uncommon actually. They usually come in brown or gray in color. I told Barry I would be nearby when we hunted for the grouper, but. But soon later, I saw Barry pop high out of the water screaming help me. Help. I looked underwater and I noticed that an enormous heavy bodied white shark the size of a female orca knocked into Barry and then kept on going after the huge grouper. It looked like the great white was hunting the grouper like we were. I reached Barry and thankfully he was alright. He said that he was a bit bruised and dazed from the hit, but the shark didn't bite him or hit him fully. Barry then signaled me to get under the water really quickly to hide from the mammoth shark because no doubt he would come looking for us. We hid behind a huge sea rock and tall sea grass. No sooner than I got next to Barry behind the huge rock, our shark friend came racing back looking for us. The shark looked angry and probably wanted to kill us for losing the grouper he was chasing. This was an enormous male white shark. Barry and I were worried. We needed the shark to leave soon because we were running out of oxygen in our tanks and Barry had lost his speargun in the hit from the shark. I was also worried that the shark was so huge my speargun would not be enough to kill it. Finally, the great white shark left and Barry and I started to go up to the surface of the water. But before we did, we both had noticed the huge shark from the distance. It was our shark. The bulk of it was enormous even from a distance away. Barry and I then let loose some oxygen bubbles to distract the sharks so we could get away. I looked back and I only saw the bubbles and no shark chasing, which was good. Great whites and other sharks were very territorial and we could have been in his hunting grounds too. This shark seemed like he wanted to kill us for losing that grouper rather than eat us. I looked back again and was happy there was still no shark. Then Barry and I both looked down in alarm and saw the huge shark coming at us from below. The gray, white and other sharks were masters of stealth. I was lucky enough to see it in time and I aimed my speargun and shot at it in its direction. The spear zoomed in the water and went right in between the open mouth of the shark. It must have hit vital organs because blood started to pour out of the shark's mouth as it began to thrash its huge conical snout from side to side in the water in agony. Barry and I were not going to wait around watching because the blood from this shark would surely attract other sharks as well. When I hit the surface of the water first, I had signaled Roger to come in his boat to get us fast. As I saw the boat turn around to get us, Barry and I then saw a frightened sight. We saw a huge dorsal fin racing towards us. I didn't have any weapon to fight the shark with at all since my speargun went with the injured shark. Barry and I were soon relieved that this was just a giant sunfish checking us out. Sunfish were harmless and only fed on jellyfish, algae and zooplankton. When Barry and I got on the boat, we explained everything that happened to Roger as we all got together and gave each other a big hug at the same time. Grateful that we survived the shark attack, Barry and I did not see the great white that I shot, but it is assumed that I killed it with my speargun. Barry and I were the only people to see this great white. But we estimate the size to be at least 20ft long. Even though there are no shark experts to verify this finding. Here's some information about sharks. There were about 102 shark attacks in the year of 2010 when this happened to us. Mainly the fatal great white shark attacks are what are usually talked about. Ours was not since we survived. The state of California has the most white sharks in America. Great whites attack humans more than any other shark. The state of Florida has the most shark bites. The most great whites are found in South Africa, California, Australia, New Zealand and Mexico. After this great white shark encounter, Barry, Roger and me still scuba dived. But we were much safer. Now we did not scuba dive near the Farelin Islands where the great white sharks hunt seals on a regular basis. Later, we all finished the California university we attended. Now Roger is a marine biologist in California. Barry is a pro bodybuilder and still loves to explore marine life to this day. And I'm a swimsuit model. Barry and I eventually got married with Roger being his best man at our wedding. Plus, it's true what the shark experts say, once you survive a shark attack, you will never forget it if you're alignment in charge of keeping the lights on. 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