Awesome Or Off-Putting: Spontaneous Involuntary Human Invisibility

Awesome or Off-Putting is a weekly delve into cryptozoology, ufology, other paranormal phenomenon, medical marvels, scientific wonders, secret societies, government conspiracies, cults, ghosts, myths, religion, strange facts or just plain weird, weird
goings-on.

This week: Paranormal Phenomenon

Most people have heard of spontaneous combustion - it's accompanying story's usually in the form of some senior citizen sitting in her recliner watching TV, when she bursts into flames for no apparent reason whatsoever. Well spontaneous invisibility is kind of like that, but as the name implies, the after effects of the sudden come-on are total invisibility. Generally speaking, the people who've turned invisible don't usually realise they've slipped into a transparent state.

Spontaneous invisibility is the name of a pretty recently noticed phenomena. It means just what it sounds like - people suddenly, uncontrollably and temporarily turning invisible. When this happens, nobody can see or hear the invisible person, even though in all these cases the victims are in the presence of at least one other person. It's a strange occurrence, but is it true? The stories speak for themselves…

The foremost authority on spontaneous invisibility is Donna Higbee. She began researching spontaneous invisibility in 1994, and said of it's victims:

"In every case I have heard about or personally researched, the person is physically still present, although unable to be seen or heard. From the point of view of the invisible person, the world looks normal and they have no idea that they cannot be seen or heard by people around them."

The following are examples of the anomaly, some of which have been culled from Higbee's own website - A 37-year-old English man was at a party in 1987. At one point the gentleman had to use the bathroom. He walked upstairs, and was followed by a woman who allowed him first usage of the facilities. When he was finished, he walked out and closed the door behind him. The woman waiting must have been otherwise occupied - as she didn't see the door open or close. The Englishman went downstairs, where he started talking to his friends, all of which completely ignored him. He then approached his girlfriend for a cigarette - she also acted like she didn't see or hear him. Puzzled by this, he went back upstairs where the woman still waiting for the bathroom was extremely surprised to see him on her side of the door. He'd walked right past her on the way out, and she hadn't see a thing. Afterwards, his friends and girlfriend all insisted they hadn't seen or heard him.

Another instance occurred when a group of friends were setting off fire crackers. The police came to squelch the fun, and took everybody's IDs. Well almost everybody's. One man, named Daniel, was excluded from the identification process. He states:

"The cops started at the other end of the line (there were two lines, one in front of the other) of people. I was standing behind a friend, who was a girl. The cop asked each person to hand him their IDs as he passed down the line. Then he would take the ID and call in each person. I was the last one in the behind line. I was also the largest person there. I was even larger than the policemen. The cop never even acted like he saw me. He never asked me for my ID. Neither of the two cops paid any attention to me. All of my friends, except the two who were taken in by the police, thought I had left. Many asked me afterward where I went to hide. I told all of them that I was there. No one would believe me."

This next instance has an extra terrestrial flavor to it. In south Minneapolis around 1997 (give or take a few years) there was a power failure. Several neighbors in an apartment building stepped out into the hall to see what was going on. One woman stepped to a window at the end of the hall and looked across the street. Hovering over the structures there was a UFO. The woman was understandably surprised. When she tried to draw her neighbours' attentions to the ship, she couldn't. That's not to say she didn't make an effort, they just couldn't see or hear her. When she turned back to the window, the ship was gone. One neighbour later said that although they'd seen her go to the window, they never saw her at the window.

There have been very few of these spontaneous invisibility instances reported. Whether the scarcity of reports erodes it's credibility - well that's pretty much the reader's call. It's important to note that past masters of something-or-other have been documented as teaching the ability to turn things invisible at will. In fact, the nice folks over at About.com have been considerate enough to post a step by step procedural on how to turn small and large objects invisible. It also details how to turn yourself that way. See the link below for that fun, but know that doing so insinuates a promise to always stay way out of our shower.

Read more:

Invisibility - About.com

[story by Shawn Lindseth]