[00:00.000 --> 00:03.560]  I can't tell and not writing on the bathroom walls.
[00:04.900 --> 00:09.420]  But this is Hacking the Physical World with John and Laura Leita.
[00:15.080 --> 00:15.820]  Thank you.
[00:18.480 --> 00:21.680]  I'm John Leita, editor of Long Island Oddities, a magazine.
[00:22.500 --> 00:24.640]  It's about weird places on Long Island.
[00:25.100 --> 00:29.020]  And it discusses urban exploring as a main thing.
[00:29.140 --> 00:33.940]  Urban exploring, for those of you who don't know, which I think most of you do, can I see signs of hands how many people know?
[00:34.220 --> 00:35.760]  And now how many people have?
[00:36.830 --> 00:40.470]  Okay, urban exploring is seeing things that other people don't normally see.
[00:40.650 --> 00:44.720]  It's finding ways into things that other people don't normally get into.
[00:44.920 --> 00:46.850]  It's alternative ways of getting around.
[00:47.040 --> 00:53.460]  Maybe going from class to class through the steam tunnels instead of, you know, the paved pathways and the lawns where you're supposed to walk.
[00:54.210 --> 00:56.220]  And we're going to talk a little bit about that.
[00:57.220 --> 00:58.540]  Hi, can everybody hear me?
[00:59.270 --> 00:59.940]  Okay, good.
[01:00.240 --> 01:01.300]  My name is Laura.
[01:01.300 --> 01:03.860]  I've also been co-editor of Long Island Oddities.
[01:04.240 --> 01:06.040]  And I've been an explorer for many years.
[01:06.700 --> 01:09.920]  Does any of you know the term urban exploring is vading?
[01:10.640 --> 01:11.860]  Anybody ever heard of vading?
[01:12.460 --> 01:13.660]  This was something...
[01:14.180 --> 01:14.980]  Okay, good.
[01:15.200 --> 01:18.920]  This was something out of MIT that used to be a text adventure game.
[01:19.060 --> 01:20.920]  Just like they were talking about in retrocomputing.
[01:21.120 --> 01:22.100]  The wampus is near you.
[01:22.620 --> 01:28.240]  But anyway, the system admins would try to delete this game, which was called ADV something, the file name.
[01:28.240 --> 01:29.900]  They changed it to VAD.
[01:30.180 --> 01:32.240]  And then the people couldn't find it to delete it.
[01:32.380 --> 01:38.280]  So that's where it came from, just finding little things to, you know, get what you want unconventionally.
[01:38.480 --> 01:41.220]  Well, that's basically urban exploring physically.
[01:41.260 --> 01:42.940]  And it is related to hacking.
[01:47.860 --> 01:50.080]  I found a definition of to hack.
[01:50.420 --> 01:52.660]  It's not necessarily for computers.
[01:53.040 --> 01:56.800]  The term came from long before computers were ever invented.
[01:57.140 --> 02:02.600]  It means to do something in an unconventional way, not the way it was used for to get what you want done.
[02:02.780 --> 02:05.060]  Whether it's going into a building for curiosity.
[02:05.400 --> 02:09.000]  Steam tunnels weren't meant to be tourist attractions, just to go look around, take pictures.
[02:09.000 --> 02:10.800]  They're meant for utilitarian purposes.
[02:11.080 --> 02:14.040]  But you're using it unconventionally to get what you want done.
[02:14.580 --> 02:16.860]  I've also found this definition of urban exploring.
[02:16.880 --> 02:20.880]  It's many things to many people, but this pretty much sums it up.
[02:25.400 --> 02:30.240]  Yeah, and urban exploring does a lot of different things to many people.
[02:30.380 --> 02:31.860]  First of all, it raises your awareness.
[02:32.300 --> 02:33.500]  You'll start walking around.
[02:33.520 --> 02:36.220]  You'll notice doors, vents, pipes, whatever.
[02:36.240 --> 02:37.300]  It brings your attention.
[02:37.320 --> 02:38.840]  Most people just walk around unaware.
[02:38.840 --> 02:44.280]  I'm sure some of you found some interesting things, even walking around the hotel, just looking around.
[02:44.560 --> 02:46.440]  You just... you start noticing things.
[02:46.840 --> 02:50.660]  It also forces you to learn the history of places and to learn about where you are.
[02:50.760 --> 02:51.680]  You're in steam tunnels.
[02:51.780 --> 02:52.380]  How do they work?
[02:52.500 --> 02:53.020]  What do they do?
[02:53.120 --> 02:53.640]  Are there dangers?
[02:53.840 --> 02:56.800]  What... it forces you to study and learn about your surroundings.
[02:59.500 --> 03:07.160]  One of the coolest things about urban exploring is it also teaches you to look at ordinary physical objects in a different way.
[03:07.160 --> 03:08.960]  It changes your whole perception.
[03:09.280 --> 03:13.640]  This building here, there was an opening vent up on the roof.
[03:13.780 --> 03:14.780]  National Guard Armory.
[03:15.560 --> 03:15.980]  Yeah.
[03:16.560 --> 03:17.120]  Abandoned though.
[03:17.560 --> 03:17.660]  Yeah.
[03:19.620 --> 03:21.420]  Well, there was an opening on the roof.
[03:21.600 --> 03:22.480]  No other way in.
[03:23.020 --> 03:28.600]  These windows here that you see, I don't know if you can see that they're barred, but if you go on more, you can see the barred windows.
[03:29.300 --> 03:30.520]  Designed to keep people out.
[03:30.520 --> 03:31.120]  Yeah.
[03:31.460 --> 03:33.120]  They become nice, handy ladders.
[03:35.280 --> 03:37.040]  And this is also one of my favorites.
[03:38.280 --> 03:42.740]  This here is inside of an elevator shaft in an abandoned psychiatric center.
[03:42.900 --> 03:47.060]  I won't mention names, place, or date, but we were... this is one of my favorite tales.
[03:47.180 --> 03:51.400]  We were walking around in this sub-basement, looking for the stairs to get up.
[03:51.400 --> 03:54.100]  And this is a 12, 13-story building we wanted to explore.
[03:54.700 --> 04:06.280]  So, we happened to be walking by, and John here, he says, oh, he peeks into this elevator shaft, which to me looked like a bunch of old rusted cables and a huge rusted elevator two floors above, waiting to come down.
[04:06.980 --> 04:10.600]  Well, he looks and he says, oh, well, if we can't find the stairs, we could try this.
[04:10.760 --> 04:13.580]  And I looked at him and I said, okay, very funny, find the stairs.
[04:14.420 --> 04:16.560]  But, turns out, we got used to it.
[04:16.640 --> 04:17.220]  We came in here...
[04:17.220 --> 04:17.740]  I found a ladder.
[04:18.280 --> 04:18.620]  Yeah.
[04:19.660 --> 04:29.240]  It actually... your thought of climbing an elevator shaft or scaling or climbing in an elevator shaft would normally give you thoughts of danger, all sorts of horrible fears.
[04:29.460 --> 04:30.400]  It actually wasn't that hard.
[04:30.400 --> 04:33.600]  You just climbed up the ladder, pulled yourself into the ledge.
[04:33.740 --> 04:37.080]  The elevator door had been bent backwards by, apparently, previous visitors.
[04:37.400 --> 04:38.600]  It wasn't too hard.
[04:39.220 --> 04:41.500]  That's a picture of the elevator shaft you saw.
[04:42.260 --> 04:44.460]  Also, urban explorers do many things.
[04:44.580 --> 04:50.520]  There are some people that will explore abandoned railroad spurs, which is not... I'm not really sure if it's trespassing or not.
[04:50.620 --> 04:51.240]  Sometimes it is.
[04:51.260 --> 04:51.860]  Sometimes it's not.
[04:51.940 --> 04:53.780]  It depends on who you talk to, I guess.
[04:54.060 --> 04:56.140]  But, it's not always trespassing.
[04:56.300 --> 04:57.580]  However, a lot of it is.
[04:57.680 --> 04:59.200]  This is an example of tunneling.
[05:00.120 --> 05:04.120]  They include the steam tunnels that run through most live campuses.
[05:04.360 --> 05:05.920]  People do explore live steam tunnels.
[05:05.920 --> 05:08.700]  Nice 125 degree temperatures, sometimes.
[05:10.060 --> 05:11.840]  Also, abandoned steam tunnels.
[05:12.020 --> 05:12.780]  And also, the people...
[05:12.780 --> 05:16.060]  Anyone ever have a trip to the New York City abandoned subway lines?
[05:16.800 --> 05:18.160]  That's also tunneling.
[05:21.210 --> 05:22.910]  And then, also, there's a...
[05:22.910 --> 05:24.330]  We're exploring abandoned buildings.
[05:24.590 --> 05:26.950]  We found this hallway in another abandoned psych center.
[05:27.010 --> 05:29.690]  I call this Rainbow Hall because every room's got a different color.
[05:30.270 --> 05:32.050]  And you just find interesting things.
[05:32.050 --> 05:35.210]  You walk around and you start to feel the vibe of what the place once was.
[05:35.490 --> 05:36.370]  What it could be.
[05:36.530 --> 05:36.850]  What...
[05:36.850 --> 05:37.750]  Who used to be here.
[05:38.090 --> 05:39.350]  What they used to have in here.
[05:39.430 --> 05:42.190]  Sometimes you'll look at paperwork and things that they leave around.
[05:43.790 --> 05:44.670]  Another thing...
[05:44.670 --> 05:47.570]  And one I haven't really enjoyed very much.
[05:47.750 --> 05:50.470]  I prefer to keep my feet mostly on the ground unless I have to.
[05:50.850 --> 05:52.270]  But there's something called buildering.
[05:52.670 --> 05:56.430]  Which is people actually urban explore by scaling the size of buildings.
[05:57.170 --> 05:58.690]  And getting as high as you can.
[05:59.270 --> 06:01.650]  And sometimes they scale other things.
[06:02.570 --> 06:05.250]  This guy up here would scale anything.
[06:05.470 --> 06:06.410]  I don't care how high it was.
[06:06.590 --> 06:09.470]  We ran into him and I was just in awe.
[06:09.730 --> 06:11.690]  But that's another aspect of urban exploring.
[06:11.830 --> 06:12.490]  It's many things.
[06:13.950 --> 06:15.890]  Also, even this here.
[06:16.070 --> 06:19.070]  Even if you're in a public area where you're allowed to be.
[06:19.270 --> 06:22.830]  You can also urban explore by looking around your surroundings.
[06:23.030 --> 06:25.930]  This was found at Suffolk Community College in Brentwood.
[06:26.410 --> 06:27.650]  This says PSH.
[06:28.510 --> 06:30.730]  That means Pilgrim State Hospital.
[06:30.730 --> 06:33.550]  That campus was once used by a mental institution.
[06:33.930 --> 06:36.190]  And just walking down the street you see these things.
[06:36.430 --> 06:40.950]  So it's really related to hacking as far as when you see a computer system.
[06:41.210 --> 06:42.410]  You want to get curious.
[06:42.530 --> 06:43.150]  You want to play around.
[06:43.190 --> 06:43.930]  See what's in there.
[06:44.330 --> 06:47.330]  You know, you want to learn the different systems and everything.
[06:47.690 --> 06:49.050]  It's the same way with buildings.
[06:49.130 --> 06:49.850]  It's curiosity.
[06:49.870 --> 06:51.790]  It's desire to document the history.
[06:51.790 --> 06:53.950]  And you do things unconventionally.
[06:54.110 --> 06:56.810]  You can slip in cracks that people wouldn't even normally think you can get in.
[06:56.890 --> 06:58.510]  Basement windows, vents, whatever.
[06:59.570 --> 07:01.130]  It's not what it's intended to be.
[07:01.210 --> 07:05.770]  But it gives you a sense of satisfaction that you've seen something that most people do not.
[07:07.590 --> 07:11.190]  I'm going to talk a little bit about legal issues aside on this.
[07:11.330 --> 07:14.110]  I'm sure that a lot of you realize that there must be something.
[07:15.030 --> 07:18.410]  One of the lucky things is opposed to computer trespassing.
[07:18.670 --> 07:22.510]  Most of the trespassing charges, not all but a lot, are misdemeanors.
[07:22.730 --> 07:25.850]  Whereas with computer trespassing, they slap felonies on there.
[07:25.850 --> 07:29.350]  So that's one bit of relief, a little, I guess.
[07:30.410 --> 07:39.510]  As long as, you know, you're intelligent about yourself, you look like you belong, you're not doing anything, you know, asshole-like, excuse my language.
[07:40.470 --> 07:43.830]  Usually if you do get caught, which is rare, you'll just get told to leave.
[07:44.270 --> 07:47.690]  Whereas, you know, if you get caught trespassing on a computer, it could be a lot worse.
[07:49.770 --> 07:51.910]  I'm going to try to give the laws for, like, my area.
[07:51.910 --> 07:54.750]  And I'm not a lawyer, so don't take my advice as legal advice.
[07:54.750 --> 07:57.690]  So I'm just going to give things that I found on the web and I'm going to quote them.
[07:57.890 --> 07:59.830]  And you can interpret that how you see fit.
[08:02.930 --> 08:04.730]  There's trespass and there's criminal trespass.
[08:04.810 --> 08:06.190]  A lot of people are confused on this.
[08:06.250 --> 08:10.270]  From my research, it appears that trespass is more of a civil thing.
[08:10.370 --> 08:12.750]  You could be sued for trespassing on someone's property.
[08:13.130 --> 08:22.910]  They can sue you for anything that, you know, you might have caused damage to in getting there, which is a whole other legal issue where they could just sue you just for being there when you're not supposed to be.
[08:24.090 --> 08:31.230]  And criminal trespass is when you're actually brought and charged as a criminal and the district attorney decides to prosecute it.
[08:33.830 --> 08:37.650]  Criminal trespassing is being in a place you're not supposed to be.
[08:37.870 --> 08:39.350]  It doesn't have to be posted.
[08:40.010 --> 08:42.250]  In most places, it doesn't have to be posted.
[08:42.430 --> 08:44.710]  It just has to be somebody else's property.
[08:44.710 --> 08:47.890]  I don't know about you, but my house doesn't say no trespassing on it.
[08:47.970 --> 08:52.710]  Yet, if I left my door unlocked and you just walked into my house, it would be trespassing.
[08:53.710 --> 09:01.990]  So, it does make it a little bit more worse if you get caught and it's posted or if somebody tells you not to be there, because then it's obvious you had full intent.
[09:02.510 --> 09:07.450]  And even if it's not in written law, you are going to get treated a lot more harshly if it's posted, obviously.
[09:08.530 --> 09:12.490]  In New York, there's second degree and first degree trespassing.
[09:12.810 --> 09:15.050]  Second degree trespassing is what I just mentioned.
[09:15.250 --> 09:17.090]  It's being some place you're not authorized to be.
[09:17.530 --> 09:21.450]  In New York, first degree trespassing is a felony.
[09:21.670 --> 09:23.570]  The second degree is a misdemeanor.
[09:23.750 --> 09:29.510]  And what makes this a felony is you have an arm on you, a firearm.
[09:30.490 --> 09:35.070]  Being on somebody's property illegal with a firearm makes it a felony.
[09:35.070 --> 09:37.810]  On top of whatever charges you might get for having a firearm.
[09:38.450 --> 09:40.990]  Bottom line, if you're urban explorer, you really don't need weapons.
[09:41.270 --> 09:43.890]  Everybody says, oh, you're going in these abandoned places.
[09:43.890 --> 09:46.670]  You're going to have crackheads running out of closets trying to kill you.
[09:47.350 --> 09:51.290]  I've been in over 300 places and I've never had anybody try to kill me once.
[09:51.670 --> 09:53.530]  I usually don't even run into people.
[09:55.750 --> 09:56.970]  I've explored in the Bronx.
[09:57.050 --> 09:57.910]  I've explored in Brooklyn.
[09:57.910 --> 09:59.170]  I've explored all over.
[10:00.270 --> 10:01.070]  You know what?
[10:02.170 --> 10:04.150]  I'll take questions afterwards.
[10:07.150 --> 10:10.050]  Other possible crimes associated with urban exploring.
[10:11.070 --> 10:12.210]  Also breaking and entering.
[10:12.690 --> 10:15.110]  Now these laws might be a little shocking to some people.
[10:15.230 --> 10:16.730]  Breaking and entering, what do you picture right away?
[10:16.870 --> 10:22.850]  You picture, you know, somebody in a ski mask breaking a window with a rock or prying a door off or picking a lock.
[10:23.050 --> 10:23.710]  Not true.
[10:23.910 --> 10:27.970]  If you turn the doorknob to open the door, you just broke and entered if you're not allowed to be there.
[10:27.970 --> 10:35.810]  Breaking and entering in most states is the slightest amount of force used above and beyond just walking in to gain entry.
[10:35.990 --> 10:39.590]  If you push a board to the side without breaking it, you're very careful about that.
[10:39.770 --> 10:43.090]  And then you put it back in place after you're done, you just broke and entered.
[10:43.310 --> 10:53.830]  If you open a door and the sign says no trespassing and you walk in, you had to turn that doorknob and open that door, you may have just broken and entered, which can be charged on top of the trespassing.
[10:55.550 --> 10:55.950]  Burglary.
[10:56.090 --> 11:01.570]  A lot of people picture, I bet you right away, somebody taking your TV set and walking down the street with it, a real sneaky like.
[11:01.650 --> 11:02.290]  Not true.
[11:02.550 --> 11:11.090]  If you break and enter with the purpose to commit another crime, even if that other crime is not theft, you are now guilty of burglary.
[11:11.230 --> 11:16.190]  I know somebody in New Jersey that was running a website that was charged with this.
[11:16.190 --> 11:24.370]  And I believe, don't quote me on this, I believe that the other crime was the loitering inside once he got there.
[11:24.490 --> 11:32.670]  So just going in and breaking and entering, they could automatically charge it as burglary pretty much, because you are committing another crime once inside.
[11:32.830 --> 11:36.630]  You're loitering, you're trespassing, there's other things you're doing.
[11:39.430 --> 11:43.770]  Now I'm going to talk about more of the fun stuff, now that we've got the legal issues out of the way.
[11:43.770 --> 11:46.670]  And finding places to urban explore.
[11:46.850 --> 11:55.910]  One way to do it in your area, might not be advisable, because it does lead to dangerous places, is to look up Superfund sites.
[11:57.130 --> 12:05.250]  Superfund sites are those listed by the government as toxic, that stuff has been dumped there and is unmaintained.
[12:05.810 --> 12:08.610]  And usually those are abandoned, sometimes not though.
[12:09.450 --> 12:11.630]  I would recommend only going for the abandoned ones.
[12:11.690 --> 12:17.910]  You don't want to go to a place that has harmful chemicals that still use, especially with the craziness that's going on today.
[12:18.110 --> 12:24.790]  But that picture there in the middle, that's where most of the Grumman World War II planes were made.
[12:24.850 --> 12:29.450]  It sits there abandoned and they have chemicals all around, so it was listed as a Superfund site.
[12:32.150 --> 12:36.410]  Some websites where you can use to find places to urban explore are a great resource.
[12:36.610 --> 12:40.590]  There's a lot of explorers in Canada and one of them is uer.ca.
[12:41.810 --> 12:45.350]  And they have a database of places that people put to explore.
[12:45.430 --> 12:56.130]  The only problem with it is, when somebody finds a new place that's really, really cool, they usually don't put it on the database right away until they've been there a thousand times, taken pictures of every piece of dust and every angle.
[12:56.130 --> 12:59.230]  Because you don't want everybody else showing up and ruining it.
[13:00.090 --> 13:02.570]  So you kind of keep places a secret until it's finished.
[13:02.750 --> 13:05.050]  And then you're kind of like, look at this, this place is cool.
[13:07.850 --> 13:13.310]  But the best way to find places is as you drive around your area, keep an awareness about you.
[13:13.450 --> 13:14.150]  Like, look around.
[13:14.370 --> 13:16.810]  Like, you pass that building with the boards on it every day.
[13:16.910 --> 13:17.410]  Is it old?
[13:17.990 --> 13:19.310]  What history does it have?
[13:19.410 --> 13:21.250]  Maybe go to the library and ask about it.
[13:21.430 --> 13:24.310]  It might be a place that's, you know, interesting and worthy of urban exploring.
[13:25.910 --> 13:28.250]  Now, finding ways in once you find a site.
[13:28.430 --> 13:32.270]  This is considering the site is illegal, that you're not allowed to be there, that you shouldn't go there.
[13:32.330 --> 13:33.630]  I'm not advising you to go there.
[13:33.730 --> 13:35.070]  I'm advising you not to.
[13:35.410 --> 13:40.790]  But this is how somebody might find a way in if they did choose to violate all my...
[13:42.550 --> 13:49.470]  What you do is, like, if it has a fence around it, go into the area that's hardest to get to around the fence.
[13:49.670 --> 14:00.750]  Like, if you see, like, an area that's right on the street, chances are there's not going to be any openings there because the person who owns the abandoned property would probably repair them pretty quickly.
[14:01.090 --> 14:04.750]  You want to go to a place, people are lazy, where they don't want to go to repair it.
[14:04.750 --> 14:13.670]  So, if there's railroad tracks and there's, like, all brush and it's, like, debris and it's, like, hard and dangerous to climb over and get to it, that's where a hole in the fence is going to be.
[14:13.890 --> 14:15.150]  That's where you can climb through.
[14:15.190 --> 14:20.410]  If the fence is barbed-wired, that's where the barbed wire is going to be rusted and stripped off.
[14:22.990 --> 14:30.950]  To get into buildings, once you get past the fence, don't think right away of pulling boards off, or usually work is not required.
[14:31.810 --> 14:39.230]  I advise that you don't do any of this, but if you did do it, and you have to do work to get in the building, do something so you can repair it afterwards.
[14:39.230 --> 14:43.170]  Just that a respect for the security, because they can get in trouble.
[14:43.370 --> 14:48.690]  If boards are off all the time, they get a lot of slack for it, and that rolls downhill back to the urban explorers.
[14:48.770 --> 14:51.390]  So, if a board comes off, make sure it goes back on.
[14:51.490 --> 14:59.850]  And also, you want to keep, you know, lesser intelligent people out of, an entrance you created, because they're going to get hurt inside, and then it's going to bring a whole world of shit down.
[15:01.710 --> 15:08.890]  Like I said, if boards, again, go to the hardest place around the building, the place that's most difficult to go to, and look in places where other people wouldn't.
[15:09.030 --> 15:10.850]  Like, look into basement wells.
[15:11.030 --> 15:13.510]  Like, if it goes down four or five feet, jump down there.
[15:13.670 --> 15:15.170]  That's where the board is going to be open.
[15:15.210 --> 15:17.710]  That's where you're going to be able to get into an abandoned building.
[15:18.730 --> 15:20.890]  Because people, you know, they're lazy.
[15:21.010 --> 15:23.530]  They don't repair these as much, and they might not even notice them.
[15:24.690 --> 15:28.030]  I've seen plenty of entrances that I haven't even maybe used.
[15:28.710 --> 15:31.770]  And they've been there for years, and just nobody notices.
[15:31.970 --> 15:36.510]  And even teenagers that do urban exploring, and they permeate every other site.
[15:36.610 --> 15:39.890]  They don't find these entrances, because they look for the more common ones.
[15:42.650 --> 15:43.090]  Padlocks.
[15:44.330 --> 15:46.590]  If you know how to pick them, do so.
[15:47.830 --> 15:49.630]  Cutting them is bad, because like, alright.
[15:50.030 --> 15:54.810]  Well, picking them is also... adds another crime in that you now have tools.
[15:55.530 --> 15:59.170]  Burglary tools, which is a whole other felony, and a whole other ball of shit.
[15:59.290 --> 16:00.810]  So maybe you shouldn't carry the tools around.
[16:02.490 --> 16:10.130]  Sometimes, though, like, the hinge, if it's an abandoned building, it'll be so rotted that you can just kind of take the hinge off, and the door will open with the padlock still on it.
[16:10.570 --> 16:11.870]  And then you don't have burglary tools.
[16:12.010 --> 16:14.030]  You're still breaking and entering, but you don't have tools.
[16:16.050 --> 16:22.590]  And I would recommend, if you do urban explore, don't go in any building where you can't, you know, repair the entrance that you've been in.
[16:24.890 --> 16:26.970]  Some ways of computer-assisted exploring.
[16:28.750 --> 16:35.510]  TopoZone is a great website, and it allows you to pull up USGS topological maps, which I'll show you one of.
[16:36.410 --> 16:43.210]  Recently, I heard about a really cool psych center I wanted to see, and I couldn't find exact directions.
[16:43.510 --> 16:47.870]  And a lot of people, they email me because I run this site, and they're like, how do I know the address?
[16:48.210 --> 16:52.730]  And, you know, abandoned buildings, they might have addresses, but, you know, you don't know them.
[16:53.150 --> 17:00.210]  You could look up TopoZone, and the topological maps, because the United States only creates them every so often.
[17:00.370 --> 17:00.930]  They're outdated.
[17:01.430 --> 17:05.690]  So, like, you'll see buildings that aren't there anymore, and they're great for doing research.
[17:05.830 --> 17:07.470]  Urban explorers like to do research, too.
[17:07.810 --> 17:19.070]  When you find a site and you go into it, if you're really passionate about it, half the stuff you do is going to be off-site in some archive somewhere in a museum, looking through old pictures, comparing it to the way it is now.
[17:19.070 --> 17:21.170]  I'm like, oh, wow, this changed, and that changed.
[17:22.610 --> 17:26.110]  Another way you can get aerial views, a lot of you probably know, is Globe Explorer.
[17:27.290 --> 17:31.690]  MapQuest had awesome access to Globe Explorer up until recently, and they took it down.
[17:31.970 --> 17:36.810]  Probably has something to do with Bush saying that that was a, you know, aerial maps were a terrorist tool.
[17:37.110 --> 17:41.290]  So, now you can go directly to Global Explorer and get it, but it's a smaller map.
[17:41.650 --> 17:46.510]  They limit it in many ways, and they have much more watermarks all over it that make it hard to read.
[17:48.170 --> 17:54.950]  Microsoft, sorry about mentioning them, but they have a terrorist server, which it's actually pretty good, but they're a little dated.
[17:55.110 --> 17:55.850]  They're black and white.
[17:56.170 --> 17:58.770]  But Microsoft did a really good job of it.
[17:58.830 --> 18:00.430]  You can get large aerial views.
[18:00.610 --> 18:07.450]  And the cool thing is, if you use all three of these together, you can get, like, a dated history of the place.
[18:08.610 --> 18:10.710]  This is a hospital that I was looking for.
[18:10.870 --> 18:13.750]  I kind of blurred out the name, because I don't want to give out exact locations.
[18:14.490 --> 18:17.790]  And this hospital had something that's called a Kirkbride.
[18:17.950 --> 18:30.750]  Kirkbride was a leader of psychiatric care in the 1800s, and he developed this thing where all the mental patients would live like a family, and it would be like a mile long of buildings that are connected, and you can kind of see that in there.
[18:30.750 --> 18:37.790]  And the director would live in the center, and all the patients off to the side, kind of like the father in the center, and the extended family off the side.
[18:37.990 --> 18:45.630]  And he also believed that these buildings should be aesthetic, because for recovery, patients should be in a setting that looks relaxing and nice.
[18:45.810 --> 18:47.970]  So they were consequently built like castles.
[18:48.630 --> 18:54.310]  So I pulled an aerial map of it, which was from 1995, and sure enough, I could see the Kirkbride was still intact.
[18:54.630 --> 19:00.330]  If you look in the top center, you can kind of see the outline of it, along with a few of the other buildings that are in the topo map.
[19:00.950 --> 19:05.030]  And you could also look at the shadows, and tell if it's a huge building or a low building.
[19:05.170 --> 19:10.690]  Like if you look at the one to the south, in the center, you can see it has like a kind of large shadow.
[19:10.810 --> 19:15.070]  And in fact, that's a 10-story building that's fully abandoned in 2001.
[19:17.590 --> 19:19.490]  And there's the Kirkbride one.
[19:20.070 --> 19:23.470]  Put these two maps together, find it, and that was the resulting picture.
[19:28.250 --> 19:30.230]  A little bit of safety while urban exploring.
[19:30.590 --> 19:34.850]  Some of the things you'll come in contact with, more often than not, is asbestos.
[19:35.090 --> 19:41.970]  It's a small fiber that most filters will not filter out, and it gets into your lungs, and it stays there.
[19:42.390 --> 19:44.010]  And over time, it builds up.
[19:44.130 --> 19:46.470]  It's a cumulative thing, and it can give you many things.
[19:46.610 --> 19:50.190]  It irritates the lungs, and at minimum, it can give you emphysema.
[19:50.490 --> 19:52.830]  At its worst, it can give you lung cancer.
[19:53.430 --> 19:57.590]  And there's several other diseases it causes, but I'm not a doctor.
[19:58.650 --> 20:01.590]  One of the best protections against that is an asbestos mask.
[20:01.750 --> 20:05.410]  I recommend a respirator, like the one in the picture.
[20:05.690 --> 20:09.930]  If you're only going to do it once, they sell these cloth ones at Home Depot for like $4.
[20:10.090 --> 20:11.170]  It's better than nothing.
[20:11.430 --> 20:16.970]  It's not going to really be rated for protecting against asbestos, but buy the thicker ones.
[20:17.550 --> 20:19.790]  And how you properly put these on is...
[20:20.550 --> 20:25.830]  Because you would think it's easy to put on, but a lot of people that I go with, they look at it, and they're like all getting tangled in it.
[20:26.030 --> 20:27.090]  It has two straps.
[20:27.190 --> 20:29.050]  A good one will have two straps, because the thing...
[20:29.050 --> 20:32.350]  The problem with these is the asbestos gets around it, because it's that small.
[20:32.510 --> 20:41.690]  So a better one will have two straps, and one goes on under the ears, the other one goes on over the ears, and it has a piece of metal on the top that kind of...
[20:42.190 --> 20:44.610]  You bend it around your nose to make a tighter fit.
[20:45.670 --> 20:47.230]  And that will protect you somewhat.
[20:49.230 --> 20:51.830]  Another thing, you have to constantly be looking on the floor.
[20:52.010 --> 20:54.070]  Don't go in a place that's dark without a flashlight.
[20:54.370 --> 20:56.550]  It's not because the boogeyman is going to jump out and get you.
[20:56.630 --> 21:00.690]  It's because, you know, a three-inch nail is going to stick into your foot and get you.
[21:01.290 --> 21:03.330]  And so always use a flashlight.
[21:03.530 --> 21:04.570]  This here is...
[21:04.570 --> 21:07.110]  It's great for taking pictures in dark places.
[21:07.250 --> 21:14.570]  I'm going to talk a little bit about urban exploring photography too, because sometimes you're in a place that, you know, is all boarded up, but it's not meant for people to be in.
[21:14.670 --> 21:16.510]  So there's absolutely no light, no electricity.
[21:17.010 --> 21:21.490]  And even with a good camera and a tripod, you kind of have trouble taking a picture.
[21:21.750 --> 21:26.750]  This is a 2 million candle power flashlight.
[21:27.410 --> 21:31.410]  Actually, this is my 1.25 million, but pretty much the same thing.
[21:32.530 --> 21:36.810]  You bring something like this, and then you have an alternative LED light so you don't kill the battery.
[21:36.810 --> 21:39.210]  And then when you want to take a picture to help out your flash.
[21:41.990 --> 21:43.450]  You also have to look out for...
[21:43.450 --> 21:45.910]  These places aren't meant for people to be in anymore.
[21:46.290 --> 21:51.230]  So there's holes in the roof, water gets in, the floor and the ceiling becomes saggy.
[21:52.190 --> 21:56.130]  I'm a heavy guy and I've walked and fell through a floor once.
[21:56.350 --> 21:59.090]  And it's good to know how to deal with yourself in those situations.
[21:59.090 --> 22:04.950]  When you're on a bad floor or you feel the floor is bad, you can usually tell because it'll be wet and buckled in some places.
[22:05.170 --> 22:12.010]  Or if you have any reason to believe that the floor is not good, you want to create as much distributed weight as possible.
[22:12.070 --> 22:17.670]  So if you're going to walk, walk with your legs spread out as far as you can, so that the weight is on two parts.
[22:17.830 --> 22:20.450]  If it's a really bad floor, get down on all floors and crawl.
[22:20.550 --> 22:24.850]  You'll get dirty, it's nasty, you've got to watch for nails, but it's better than falling through a floor.
[22:27.170 --> 22:32.430]  Another thing you can kind of do is look for the beams if parts of the floor are missing and try to walk on those more.
[22:32.690 --> 22:34.770]  And just a lot of common sense goes a long way.
[22:37.730 --> 22:40.090]  Another problem is like poison ivy and ticks.
[22:40.230 --> 22:44.050]  I know those things are outside most, but you know, you don't just fly into these places.
[22:44.050 --> 22:47.330]  You have to walk through woods and brush and stuff like that.
[22:47.430 --> 22:52.010]  And it's good to know what poison ivy looks like, especially if you're highly allergic to it.
[22:52.550 --> 22:54.510]  I've caught in poison ivy like three times.
[22:54.650 --> 22:57.390]  Luckily it wasn't that bad, but you know, it is kind of nasty.
[22:58.230 --> 23:00.330]  Poison ivy is actually a little bit hard to identify.
[23:00.550 --> 23:05.370]  The only thing that can ever be said for it is it comes with three leaves on, like in the picture.
[23:05.610 --> 23:07.230]  A lot of people will tell you it's always shiny.
[23:07.370 --> 23:07.930]  That's not true.
[23:08.030 --> 23:12.470]  You can see a picture here of one poison ivy where one of the leaves is shiny and the other two are not.
[23:12.690 --> 23:14.590]  They can also be all three leaves not shiny.
[23:14.810 --> 23:16.490]  And the leaves can have all different shapes.
[23:16.650 --> 23:17.590]  There's all different variants.
[23:18.070 --> 23:21.630]  And ticks, you pretty much know what they look like when you get home.
[23:21.630 --> 23:24.890]  And take your shower to get all, you know, the garbage off or whatever.
[23:25.110 --> 23:26.530]  Like, you know, you've got to look for them.
[23:26.690 --> 23:30.230]  Because especially on Long Island you can get deer tick disease, which is nasty.
[23:34.110 --> 23:35.250]  And documenting sites.
[23:35.430 --> 23:36.650]  What do you do once you get in?
[23:38.410 --> 23:39.410]  Photography is a great thing.
[23:39.690 --> 23:43.070]  There's so many different colors in an abandoned building because of the way the paint chips.
[23:43.070 --> 23:50.690]  And there's just so many different things to see, like an angle of looking out a window in a building that's not used.
[23:50.690 --> 23:53.010]  And the way it reflects off of paint chips on the floor.
[23:53.490 --> 23:55.630]  There's really lots of artistic stuff out there.
[23:55.670 --> 23:57.610]  And you should go out on the web and see some of that.
[24:00.150 --> 24:03.090]  Because of the darkness, you're going to, you most likely will need a tripod.
[24:03.610 --> 24:10.750]  Because if you have, for those of you who don't know photography, if you have a camera, you should have a camera that allows the longest possible shutter time.
[24:11.030 --> 24:11.450]  Open time.
[24:11.550 --> 24:13.170]  The time that the shutter is actually hold open.
[24:14.190 --> 24:19.130]  And if it's anything over 150th of a second, being the film plate is cumulative.
[24:19.590 --> 24:22.650]  It's going to like build up your shakes and you're going to get a blurry picture.
[24:22.810 --> 24:24.110]  So a tripod can help with that.
[24:24.350 --> 24:27.290]  There's also a lot of other neat things I'll show later that you can do with a tripod.
[24:27.450 --> 24:30.430]  Like take multiple pictures, stitch them together and have a panorama.
[24:30.630 --> 24:32.190]  Because some places are just like breathtaking.
[24:32.850 --> 24:37.490]  There's an abandoned train station in Buffalo that's on the proportion of Grand Central Station.
[24:38.190 --> 24:41.230]  And it's that, you know, you go in there and you're like in awe.
[24:41.230 --> 24:51.150]  And you just, one picture is not going to capture it unless you have some trickery like you use a tripod or a fisheye lens and then a program to like, you know, make that look normal again.
[24:54.210 --> 25:01.390]  And you can visit our website to learn more about urban exploring or contact us at www.lioddities.com.
[25:01.590 --> 25:07.250]  I want to take this time to show some media that we created and then you can ask questions.
[25:14.470 --> 25:15.070]  Thank you.
[25:22.980 --> 25:26.920]  While he's loading that up, I'll just talk briefly about why urban explore.
[25:27.100 --> 25:33.280]  We found abandoned bowling alleys, abandoned auditoriums where they used to hold plays, especially in the mental hospitals.
[25:33.460 --> 25:35.560]  You know that patients used to be up on that stage.
[25:36.000 --> 25:37.380]  We found libraries.
[25:37.760 --> 25:40.660]  We found all sorts of interesting things.
[25:40.660 --> 25:44.160]  Library with 50,000 books still sitting in it that the state paid for.
[25:44.160 --> 25:45.760]  I was just sitting there abandoned.
[25:46.600 --> 25:48.000]  Unfortunately, piled on the floor.
[25:48.340 --> 25:50.500]  I don't know why they did that, but that's a shame.
[25:50.940 --> 25:54.620]  Also, this thing here, the little $6 flashlight from Home Depot.
[25:54.680 --> 25:56.140]  This is my baby Eclipse.
[25:56.480 --> 25:58.580]  You don't even have to hold on to it if you're climbing things.
[25:59.000 --> 25:59.860]  It's really good.
[25:59.980 --> 26:00.780]  It's quite decent.
[26:01.240 --> 26:04.200]  Yeah, you can also bend it any way you want.
[26:04.200 --> 26:06.400]  It gives a pretty decent amount of light.
[26:06.560 --> 26:08.040]  It's not perfect, but it's pretty good.
[26:17.880 --> 26:19.000]  That's as big as it gets.
[26:21.460 --> 26:24.560]  This is just a music video that was made with some open source music.
[26:31.980 --> 26:35.860]  Many buildings had corridors connecting them, so patients could be taken without going outside.
[26:35.860 --> 26:37.980]  We
[26:55.420 --> 27:02.700]  danced all teeth all round the room, just me and you.
[27:04.840 --> 27:12.580]  Then we walked in the garden, sharing our dreams and smelling perfume.
[27:14.520 --> 27:17.860]  And it happened too quickly.
[27:18.480 --> 27:23.260]  I blinked my eyes and you were gone.
[27:24.460 --> 27:28.420]  Were you real or did I imagine?
[27:28.840 --> 27:33.580]  You seemed to go with the light of the dawn.
[27:37.900 --> 27:41.040]  Today I've got a source.
[27:41.380 --> 27:46.300]  Why does it all seem so very strange?
[27:48.060 --> 27:51.620]  I am happy by these things.
[27:51.760 --> 27:53.820]  They drive me crazy.
[28:20.680 --> 28:21.860]  Thank you.
[28:27.190 --> 28:35.290]  I have another video that I made last minute before this presentation that shows some of our footage of different things that we have found inside the buildings.
[28:35.550 --> 28:38.710]  Like I said, nobody ever came out and tried to kill us or anything about that.
[28:38.770 --> 28:40.530]  But we found some pretty cute animals, though.
[28:48.800 --> 28:49.320]  Thank you.
[28:51.840 --> 28:52.600]  Oh, yeah.
[28:57.710 --> 28:58.950]  I'm just going to play it again.
[28:59.230 --> 28:59.770]  It's larger.
[29:06.390 --> 29:08.790]  This is that building from the topo map, too, by the way.
[29:08.890 --> 29:10.410]  The one that I said had a large shadow.
[29:15.890 --> 29:18.670]  This is a bat that we found sunning, actually.
[29:18.830 --> 29:20.110]  Which I don't think bats normally do that.
[29:20.210 --> 29:21.010]  But it was very alive.
[29:21.410 --> 29:23.490]  I had a bat fly up to me in a steam tunnel.
[29:23.590 --> 29:26.170]  And to get rid of it, all I had to do was make a high-pitched screech.
[29:26.410 --> 29:27.630]  Because I knew they couldn't see me.
[29:27.710 --> 29:29.170]  But every time I did, it would be...
[29:29.170 --> 29:30.610]  And the thing would fly down the tunnel.
[29:30.730 --> 29:33.810]  And it would come back until we figured out it just wanted to get past us.
[29:34.010 --> 29:36.070]  So we kind of moved out of the way and were very quiet.
[29:36.190 --> 29:36.750]  And it flew by.
[29:37.470 --> 29:39.470]  There's a chipmunk on a windowsill right there.
[29:50.950 --> 29:54.450]  There's a whole palanthra of wildlife that lives inside these buildings.
[29:54.890 --> 29:57.790]  Because, you know, they're not occupied by humans anymore.
[29:57.950 --> 29:59.010]  And I find that very...
[29:59.590 --> 30:02.150]  Oh, this is an attack by pigeons that we had.
[30:04.910 --> 30:06.970]  Pigeons are your worst enemy when you explore.
[30:07.210 --> 30:09.890]  They kind of dive bomb you and they will attack you, too.
[30:09.890 --> 30:11.930]  She was trying to get the bedroom in the window.
[30:12.170 --> 30:14.570]  And they make moaning noises that scare the heck out of you.
[30:15.030 --> 30:15.910]  A patient sandal.
[30:19.230 --> 30:20.810]  The bedroom with the two mattresses.
[30:20.950 --> 30:22.630]  Pull into it and look on the floor beyond it.
[30:22.770 --> 30:23.250]  And you'll see them.
[30:23.350 --> 30:24.110]  First look up.
[30:25.350 --> 30:27.110]  And go into the room with the two mattresses.
[30:27.170 --> 30:29.070]  And right on the floor in the entrance is a sandal.
[30:29.710 --> 30:30.910]  Well, don't look way up, Laura.
[30:31.110 --> 30:31.490]  That looks good.
[30:33.030 --> 30:35.190]  I'm making a big thing out of it in this, but it was kind of cool.
[30:35.290 --> 30:37.410]  We found a patient sandal still sitting in our room.
[30:39.170 --> 30:40.190]  Get your home, Richard.
[30:45.480 --> 30:47.720]  You can hear the way the wind just blows through.
[30:47.940 --> 30:49.480]  It's such a nice sound.
[31:20.950 --> 31:21.990]  Damn, I missed it.
[31:30.620 --> 31:31.060]  Jesus.
[31:31.460 --> 31:31.840]  Come on.
[31:32.700 --> 31:34.020]  He's gonna die by me.
[31:34.360 --> 31:35.080]  He's gonna kill me.
[31:37.340 --> 31:38.620]  Go, let me just find me.
[31:38.860 --> 31:39.260]  Help me.
[31:39.440 --> 31:39.860]  Help me.
[31:40.220 --> 31:41.020]  They're gonna kill me.
[31:49.200 --> 31:49.640]  Jesus.
[31:51.720 --> 31:53.040]  Mr. Wait, what comes up?
[31:53.140 --> 31:53.420]  Let's go.
[31:53.560 --> 31:53.820]  Wait, what comes up?
[31:58.900 --> 31:59.100]  Wait.
[31:59.100 --> 31:59.140]  What comes up?
[31:59.340 --> 31:59.380]  Let's go.
[31:59.380 --> 32:00.400]  Wait, you didn't...
[32:00.400 --> 32:01.460]  This is a half hour later.
[32:01.620 --> 32:02.780]  She's still talking about it.
[32:03.760 --> 32:04.300]  Interesting.
[32:04.500 --> 32:04.960]  Interesting.
[32:07.560 --> 32:08.100]  Sheesh.
[32:09.400 --> 32:10.360]  I hate pigeons.
[32:10.560 --> 32:12.160]  I fricking hate pigeons.
[32:12.880 --> 32:13.860]  Sorry, but I did.
[32:15.120 --> 32:16.020]  Oh, nice.
[32:16.260 --> 32:17.840]  Sitting on a park bench in the showers.
[32:18.960 --> 32:19.500]  Nice.
[32:22.820 --> 32:24.220]  Okay, welcome back.
[32:26.180 --> 32:26.800]  Nice.
[32:44.110 --> 32:48.250]  There's a program I use to stitch together things, pictures taken with a tripod.
[32:48.250 --> 32:49.390]  It's an awesome program.
[32:49.690 --> 32:52.130]  It's not free, but it's worth its cost.
[32:52.250 --> 32:53.170]  It's called Panaview.
[32:53.530 --> 32:59.310]  And I'm gonna show how I turned these two pictures that were just conjoined of a piece of murals.
[32:59.730 --> 33:02.130]  Actually, if you look on my website, this laptop doesn't have it.
[33:02.210 --> 33:05.030]  There's a whole 360 where I turned it into a QuickTime movie.
[33:05.170 --> 33:06.830]  And you could look around like you're in the room.
[33:07.250 --> 33:15.570]  And from what I've heard, certain people thought that I actually had a camera inside this abandoned building that was remote controlled because they looked at it at the right time of day when...
[33:25.740 --> 33:29.300]  But I don't know how good it's gonna show up because it's loading up with Internet Explorer.
[33:32.770 --> 33:35.730]  But this is one half and...
[33:35.730 --> 33:37.130]  Open the other half.
[33:45.970 --> 33:47.790]  I have a very old slow laptop.
[33:48.110 --> 33:49.990]  I was surprised it was able to do any of this.
[33:56.100 --> 34:02.000]  And this is the other half of that picture that you just seen.
[34:03.740 --> 34:04.540]  And together...
[34:23.240 --> 34:25.000]  You can see the top of it is bent.
[34:25.000 --> 34:27.700]  That's because the program warps it to fit it together nicely.
[34:27.940 --> 34:30.620]  You can later on crop that out with Photoshop if you want.
[34:31.280 --> 34:33.640]  I didn't here because I wanted to show that effect.
[34:33.860 --> 34:37.740]  But you can see right here is where it's split, right on the other side of the old lady.
[34:37.840 --> 34:38.800]  And you really can't see it.
[34:38.880 --> 34:40.380]  It puts it together seamlessly.
[34:40.380 --> 34:43.360]  Over here, you can see where it...
[34:43.360 --> 34:44.380]  That's actually a window.
[34:44.920 --> 34:46.600]  It's split somewhere like right around here.
[34:47.520 --> 34:48.260]  There it is.
[34:48.400 --> 34:51.240]  You can kind of see there where it bumps up and bumps down.
[34:51.800 --> 34:56.580]  But you could tweak it and play with these flags and you can get it to actually put it together seamlessly.
[34:58.520 --> 35:01.700]  And Laura's gonna tell you an urban exploring story now.
[35:02.120 --> 35:06.000]  Like, urban explorers always have stories about things that happen to them when they're doing this.
[35:06.000 --> 35:07.400]  Because, you know, weird things do happen.
[35:08.000 --> 35:08.360]  Okay.
[35:08.780 --> 35:12.300]  This is what I call, affectionately, the zombie effect.
[35:12.660 --> 35:15.760]  I don't know if you've ever seen any of those, like 1980s or even before.
[35:15.800 --> 35:17.760]  Nine of the living dead movies, et cetera.
[35:18.380 --> 35:19.560]  We were in a tunnel.
[35:19.800 --> 35:21.840]  We traveled for about maybe two, three hours.
[35:21.880 --> 35:25.640]  We knew we didn't have enough flashlight power to get us all the way back to where we were.
[35:25.640 --> 35:27.220]  And we were pretty much exhausted.
[35:27.780 --> 35:30.260]  So, well, we actually had two incidences of this.
[35:30.420 --> 35:32.520]  This, the first one, we decided to pop up.
[35:32.920 --> 35:34.700]  And this was actually in part...
[35:35.220 --> 35:38.280]  It was a set of abandoned buildings that were actually in a public park.
[35:38.540 --> 35:40.380]  But you weren't allowed to go in the buildings.
[35:41.280 --> 35:43.160]  So, what we did is we were under the tunnels.
[35:43.280 --> 35:44.140]  We decided to come up.
[35:44.360 --> 35:45.280]  We find a manhole.
[35:45.440 --> 35:46.400]  Pop the manhole open.
[35:46.520 --> 35:47.220]  Stick our head up.
[35:47.320 --> 35:48.680]  And someone's playing a football game.
[35:49.720 --> 35:50.640]  So, okay.
[35:50.640 --> 35:51.580]  We go back down.
[35:52.100 --> 35:52.960]  Figure, okay, forget it.
[35:53.000 --> 35:53.680]  We look where we are.
[35:53.680 --> 35:55.680]  We're right outside the park's main office.
[35:56.100 --> 35:57.780]  And guess who's playing the football game?
[35:57.900 --> 35:59.300]  The park manager and his family.
[36:00.880 --> 36:01.940]  So, this is...
[36:01.940 --> 36:03.340]  It's maybe around five, six at night.
[36:03.500 --> 36:04.880]  And we figure we're going to wait them out.
[36:04.980 --> 36:06.580]  How long can a football game last, really?
[36:06.700 --> 36:07.000]  Come on.
[36:07.420 --> 36:08.120]  So, we wait.
[36:08.380 --> 36:09.120]  Seven o'clock.
[36:09.500 --> 36:10.220]  Eight o'clock.
[36:10.400 --> 36:11.080]  Nine o'clock.
[36:11.200 --> 36:11.840]  It's now dark.
[36:12.200 --> 36:14.040]  And we're like, okay, they have to be done now.
[36:14.200 --> 36:15.380]  So, we pop our heads up again.
[36:15.560 --> 36:20.540]  Not only are they not done, but now they've turned on a series of spotlights so they can continue to play in the dark.
[36:22.020 --> 36:24.300]  So, it got to the point, maybe 9.30, 10 o'clock.
[36:24.420 --> 36:25.180]  I don't know what time it was.
[36:25.320 --> 36:25.980]  We were like, that's it.
[36:26.160 --> 36:27.600]  We can't take it down here anymore.
[36:27.800 --> 36:31.600]  There's asbestos and grime and dirt and mud and it's dark.
[36:32.040 --> 36:33.580]  You can only hang out there for so long.
[36:33.980 --> 36:35.080]  So, we said, forget it.
[36:35.160 --> 36:35.800]  We're popping up.
[36:35.920 --> 36:42.560]  We waited until the football game went all the way down to, I guess, what you would call, I don't know, football, one of the end zones or whatever.
[36:42.880 --> 36:44.260]  They ran all the way down the other way.
[36:44.380 --> 36:47.520]  We popped up as quick as we could, shut the lid and just walked away.
[36:47.980 --> 36:51.780]  Football people turned around, didn't know where we came from, but they certainly didn't find out we were in a tunnel.
[36:52.980 --> 36:55.920]  Now, the real zombie effect was we were also in another tunnel.
[36:56.180 --> 36:57.680]  Same thing in this public park.
[36:58.280 --> 37:00.560]  And we decided to come up, but this was not a manhole.
[37:00.680 --> 37:04.160]  This obviously used to be some sort of an entrance, but it got broken down.
[37:04.160 --> 37:08.160]  He said there was a board in the ground that would close up the entrance.
[37:08.620 --> 37:14.240]  So, he went up, he goes up and he moves the board, and all the dirt comes down on us from where the board was.
[37:14.380 --> 37:17.440]  So, now we're filthy, and there's no distinctive hole.
[37:17.560 --> 37:18.600]  It's just like a pit in the ground.
[37:19.120 --> 37:27.920]  And we come up, one hand comes up over the ground, the other hand comes up over the ground, the head pops up full of dust and dirt, you know.
[37:28.280 --> 37:32.720]  So, we finally, we climb out looking like zombies coming out of the grave, filled with dirt.
[37:32.720 --> 37:36.580]  We scramble up, and there's a couple walking right there that are standing.
[37:40.640 --> 37:44.640]  I brush myself off, look at them and say, be careful, there's a hole there.
[37:45.140 --> 37:46.700]  As I start to cover it up.
[37:51.900 --> 37:53.260]  We'll take questions now.
[37:57.200 --> 37:58.060]  Is this live?
[37:58.240 --> 38:04.420]  I love your videos which are reminiscent of the Blair Witch Project, Psycho, and the birds.
[38:05.640 --> 38:08.260]  I can tell where some of your influences come from.
[38:08.260 --> 38:18.660]  I recommend to everybody's attention, about a couple months ago, there was a woman who did a motorcycle-based exploration of Chernobyl and Kiev.
[38:20.340 --> 38:20.820]  Yes.
[38:20.840 --> 38:23.840]  It may be fake, but it's a wonderful work.
[38:24.080 --> 38:25.980]  She claims she had pictures.
[38:25.980 --> 38:28.100]  If it is a fake, I don't know where she got the pictures from.
[38:28.100 --> 38:28.820]  She had many pictures.
[38:28.940 --> 38:31.640]  There's some doubt about its complete authenticity anyway.
[38:32.820 --> 38:34.120]  You can Google for it.
[38:37.920 --> 38:38.340]  Hi.
[38:38.480 --> 38:38.660]  Hi.
[38:38.660 --> 38:39.100]  How are you doing?
[38:39.220 --> 38:45.300]  I wanted to ask, have you ever thought about bringing a police scanner or anything with you to avoid contact with the authorities?
[38:45.300 --> 38:48.420]  I haven't because usually it's just so easy to not get caught.
[38:48.780 --> 38:51.520]  It's like, you know, they don't care about this too much.
[38:51.700 --> 39:00.600]  Like, you know, I imagine with some aspects of hacking, like, I really don't hack into computer systems or do much hacking except on my own system, which is still hacking.
[39:00.740 --> 39:06.500]  I mean, I hack my own system all the time, modify it, do things it's not designed to do, but I don't do it on other people's.
[39:06.500 --> 39:12.580]  So, I know, I've heard that the laws are really strict with that, and they will come down on you, depending on who you're doing it to.
[39:12.680 --> 39:16.320]  But with this, if it's an abandoned building, they're more concerned with your safety.
[39:16.820 --> 39:24.000]  And as long as you look intelligent and, like, you're not trying to give them a hard time, and they don't see you going in, like, it's just, it's not that hard.
[39:24.520 --> 39:25.400]  Okay, thanks.
[39:26.140 --> 39:29.140]  Oh, and another thing, a police scanner adds a whole other crime to it.
[39:29.180 --> 39:34.080]  Committing any crime with the use of a police radio is, I think that's against federal law.
[39:34.140 --> 39:35.420]  I'm not sure on that, so don't quote me.
[39:35.900 --> 39:36.300]  Thanks.
[39:37.200 --> 39:39.060]  I really like the open source song.
[39:39.300 --> 39:41.320]  What's the name of it, and where can you download it?
[39:41.320 --> 39:42.860]  Yes, I planned on giving credit to that.
[39:43.300 --> 39:45.860]  I had it on the presentation somehow, that slide didn't make in.
[39:47.140 --> 39:54.580]  It was, when I first found the song, it was on this open music repository run by somebody using the GPL model.
[39:54.940 --> 39:58.140]  And I'm not sure if that song should have been on there or not.
[39:58.220 --> 39:59.320]  It was a sample.
[39:59.620 --> 40:02.300]  It was only a piece of it that I've used that was on there.
[40:02.300 --> 40:05.760]  And it was listed in parentheses with an O.
[40:06.000 --> 40:08.820]  And then it was Coven 13.
[40:09.540 --> 40:11.740]  And the name of the song is Book of Shadows.
[40:15.340 --> 40:18.280]  Right, the band has since changed its name to 713.
[40:19.060 --> 40:27.440]  And I'm probably going to email them and ask them if that song was supposed to be on that repository because since I did a little bit more investigation into it.
[40:28.100 --> 40:32.560]  When I was preparing this presentation, I started looking for more information about that band.
[40:32.960 --> 40:38.080]  And I found that they have an album for sale that you can buy too, which you should do because they're awesome.
[40:39.340 --> 40:42.040]  And, you know, I'm going to check into if they're still open source.
[40:44.260 --> 40:44.660]  Okay.
[40:45.040 --> 40:46.900]  Some small things I find to work.
[40:47.400 --> 40:51.960]  First of all, if you're already a couple and you get called by the police, just say it's a marriage proposal.
[40:52.760 --> 40:53.500]  Always works.
[40:54.740 --> 40:57.460]  The Kiev thing is real though.
[40:57.660 --> 41:02.420]  I mean, it's Chernobyl, but she took some old pictures because I've been there in 96 and I've seen it.
[41:04.180 --> 41:05.500]  And yeah, I mean, have fun.
[41:06.020 --> 41:06.620]  Enjoy it.
[41:06.780 --> 41:08.660]  What's the actual small city that...
[41:08.660 --> 41:09.100]  Pipniot.
[41:09.540 --> 41:09.940]  Pipniot.
[41:09.960 --> 41:10.860]  That's how you pronounce it.
[41:11.060 --> 41:12.380]  It's abandoned with everything.
[41:12.500 --> 41:13.180]  They just left there.
[41:13.340 --> 41:14.040]  Everything is still there.
[41:14.180 --> 41:16.380]  And right outside of Pipniot, you have like this graveyard.
[41:16.600 --> 41:18.500]  Did you explore the rad vag when you went there?
[41:18.680 --> 41:18.940]  No.
[41:19.360 --> 41:24.480]  We had lead clothing while workers were just there without any masks or anything.
[41:25.100 --> 41:29.180]  We had a dosimeter and it flipped out completely if you went inside.
[41:29.180 --> 41:33.020]  Outside was okay, but inside with the metal stuff, it's totally radiated.
[41:33.220 --> 41:34.020]  Don't go there.
[41:34.200 --> 41:37.180]  There's a city in upstate New York called Love Canal, which was...
[41:37.780 --> 41:41.400]  They found toxic stuff giving tumors to children and they abandoned the whole town.
[41:41.880 --> 41:46.460]  It's not on the scale of what you're talking about, but if you wanted to see something like that in New York...
[41:50.870 --> 41:54.750]  This is one good tip I've noticed to try, at least in my area.
[41:54.930 --> 42:07.350]  If you take a decent mountain bike and just follow rail lines, usually in urban areas they keep the rail bed wide enough that they can drive a truck down to maintain it, so the bike will fit down straight, and just take that down to an industrial area.
[42:07.530 --> 42:09.290]  Just make sure the rail line is abandoned first.
[42:09.910 --> 42:14.810]  If you stay on the bed, like off of the actual tracks, you can be like...
[42:15.370 --> 42:19.550]  It's a bit nerve-wracking at times, but you can be a good five feet away from the train, nothing will happen to you.
[42:19.730 --> 42:24.210]  Yeah, having a bicycle, if you do get spotted, also allays some of their fears too.
[42:24.210 --> 42:25.690]  You're no longer as much of a threat.
[42:26.110 --> 42:28.710]  Things that are not a threat is walking a dog.
[42:29.370 --> 42:38.650]  I've seen people go to some really, really secure places that I wouldn't have the guts to go up to, and they walk up with a dog, and as long as that dog's taking a piss on the side of the building, nobody cares.
[42:39.030 --> 42:41.510]  But the problem is, what do you do with the dog when you want to get in?
[42:41.550 --> 42:43.550]  You're not going to have him walking on broken glass and everything.
[42:43.650 --> 42:44.270]  That would be cruel.
[42:44.910 --> 42:50.050]  So I guess you could use him, the dog, to scope it out, and then when you want to do real exploring, leave the dog at home.
[42:56.910 --> 43:04.550]  The abandoned library that you went to, if you would have took a book and left, would they, and cops, would they claim that as robbery?
[43:04.770 --> 43:06.510]  Oh, they certainly would.
[43:06.690 --> 43:07.690]  You are stealing.
[43:07.870 --> 43:10.270]  I mean, the building is abandoned as far as we're concerned.
[43:10.270 --> 43:13.450]  But I mean, nothing is unowned in America.
[43:13.730 --> 43:19.090]  I mean, somebody still, whether it's the state or person, they're just not maintaining and not actively in there.
[43:19.330 --> 43:22.850]  But of course, when they take you to court, they're probably not going to make that distinction.
[43:23.350 --> 43:26.710]  And it's going to look bad for you, like you took something from someone's house.
[43:26.930 --> 43:33.270]  I mean, if you get burglary on your record, I mean, they don't, as far as I know, when somebody does a background check, they don't look into the details.
[43:33.270 --> 43:37.810]  Like, oh, he was in an abandoned building and he took a paint chip as a souvenir.
[43:38.570 --> 43:43.310]  They just see burglary and they picture you wearing a ski mask walking out of my house with my TV set.
[43:45.410 --> 43:47.210]  And, yeah, so that is a crime.
[43:47.290 --> 43:49.670]  And on top of that, there's also ethical issues.
[43:49.810 --> 43:53.610]  Urban explorers have a whole set of ethnics that if you look around the various websites...
[43:53.610 --> 43:55.970]  I didn't tell this part because I don't believe...
[43:55.970 --> 44:01.010]  There's a lot of urban explorers out there that think they're like a UE god and they have all these ethics and all that.
[44:01.010 --> 44:05.090]  And one of the ethics is, you know, take only pictures and leave only footprints.
[44:05.310 --> 44:06.510]  And I kind of agree with that one.
[44:06.650 --> 44:07.930]  So there's ethical issues.
[44:08.450 --> 44:09.050]  Thank you.
[44:09.310 --> 44:09.710]  Sure.
[44:11.850 --> 44:12.250]  Hello.
[44:12.250 --> 44:13.770]  First of all, thank you very much for your site.
[44:13.770 --> 44:15.810]  I'm from Long Island myself and it's a great resource.
[44:17.070 --> 44:23.550]  Second of all, I'm wondering what sort of tips do you have for dealing with being approached by, like, say, a security guard or a police officer?
[44:23.710 --> 44:24.690]  Be very polite.
[44:26.310 --> 44:30.070]  You know, usually before I go there, I have an excuse for why I'm there.
[44:30.070 --> 44:31.230]  Like, a legitimate excuse.
[44:31.470 --> 44:32.950]  Like, I'm cutting through to go to a park.
[44:33.390 --> 44:35.410]  And make sure that your story lines up.
[44:35.530 --> 44:36.850]  Don't say, I'm cutting through to go to...
[44:36.850 --> 44:44.850]  Because one time we were at a site and there was these bunch of hoodlums, they looked like, but I don't want to judge them, so maybe they weren't.
[44:45.010 --> 44:46.170]  And they were walking up.
[44:46.350 --> 44:49.990]  So without saying we were the police, we acted very surly.
[44:49.990 --> 44:54.390]  And we didn't say, like, freeze police or anything like that, but we said, hey, what are you guys doing here?
[44:54.590 --> 44:56.670]  Which is perfectly legal to do to somebody.
[44:56.950 --> 44:59.310]  And they were like, oh, man, we're not looking for any problems.
[44:59.310 --> 45:00.250]  We're just cutting through.
[45:00.490 --> 45:01.950]  So I said, cutting through to go where?
[45:02.210 --> 45:03.930]  And they were like, uh, over there.
[45:04.170 --> 45:05.430]  And I was like, well, what's over there?
[45:05.510 --> 45:08.990]  And they're like, uh, I don't know, just stuff.
[45:10.290 --> 45:13.790]  So, like, have your story worked out and rehearsed so that...
[45:13.790 --> 45:14.810]  I'm cutting through to go there.
[45:14.930 --> 45:15.450]  Well, what's there?
[45:15.510 --> 45:15.950]  The park.
[45:16.090 --> 45:20.390]  I always go there and I don't want to pay to park in there, so I cut through and then I can walk in.
[45:20.550 --> 45:23.790]  Like, you know, have it ready on the spot and have the stories check out.
[45:23.950 --> 45:24.810]  That's the best thing to do.
[45:25.090 --> 45:27.490]  Another thing to do is become friendly with the person.
[45:27.790 --> 45:29.910]  Like, a lot of people love to talk about what they do.
[45:30.010 --> 45:33.610]  And if they're working in an abandoned psych center, chances are they worked there when it was open.
[45:33.830 --> 45:36.790]  And a lot of them that I ran into, they worked there for 40, 50 years.
[45:36.790 --> 45:39.030]  And they have stories that just blow your mind away.
[45:39.190 --> 45:40.250]  They're not supposed to tell them to you.
[45:40.350 --> 45:42.610]  But you say to the guy, hey, how long have you worked here for?
[45:42.690 --> 45:43.590]  And he's like, oh, 40 years.
[45:43.670 --> 45:44.250]  Why do you want to know?
[45:44.430 --> 45:46.030]  I just find that so interesting.
[45:46.030 --> 45:46.930]  Can you tell me a little?
[45:47.350 --> 45:53.890]  And they're like, oh, I remember one time I was here and there was this patient that used to eat people and he was locked up and I had to drive him up.
[45:53.910 --> 45:54.730]  This is a true story.
[45:54.810 --> 45:56.810]  I'm not going to mention the patient's name for obvious reasons.
[45:57.050 --> 46:01.450]  And I had to drive this guy upstate and it was so creepy and this is what he said and this is what he did.
[46:01.750 --> 46:05.810]  And, like, the guy starts giving me a whole, like, through his eyes, history of the place.
[46:05.810 --> 46:09.330]  And then he even forgot to tell me to get lost.
[46:09.490 --> 46:10.630]  He just drove away when it was...
[46:10.630 --> 46:14.070]  He was like, oh, he looks at his watch after an hour and he's like, I gotta go now.
[46:16.450 --> 46:17.550]  Thank you very much for coming.
[46:17.950 --> 46:18.150]  Sure.
[46:18.490 --> 46:18.850]  Thank you.
[46:21.230 --> 46:21.630]  Hi.
[46:22.170 --> 46:30.250]  I wanted to mention something that I don't think you talked about, but military police do take this seriously and even if it is abandoned, it might still be...
[46:30.250 --> 46:31.730]  Try not to explore federal property.
[46:31.730 --> 46:32.110]  Right.
[46:32.590 --> 46:32.990]  It's nasty.
[46:33.430 --> 46:39.150]  It may not be inherently obvious that this is what it is, but they will consider it and they...
[46:39.150 --> 46:39.490]  Yeah.
[46:39.850 --> 46:46.330]  The only military base that I've explored has been turned into a state park sense and there's a lot of conspiracy theories behind it.
[46:46.390 --> 46:47.850]  It's Camp Hero out on Long Island.
[46:48.230 --> 46:56.950]  And I imagine that because it's the state now, even though the federal government has some munitions dumped in the woods, like there's mines or something like that, so they're a little worried about it.
[46:56.950 --> 46:59.830]  But it's under state ownership, so they're a little more hands-off.
[47:00.030 --> 47:04.590]  Well, this place was a hospital and it was a school at one point.
[47:04.770 --> 47:05.810]  It was just a huge complex.
[47:06.050 --> 47:06.750]  Sounds interesting.
[47:07.130 --> 47:07.970]  Yeah, it was.
[47:08.110 --> 47:09.290]  And I have pictures and video.
[47:09.410 --> 47:11.150]  I'm gonna get them up sometime, but...
[47:11.150 --> 47:12.310]  Send me an email.
[47:12.630 --> 47:13.170]  I'll link to it.
[47:13.170 --> 47:13.810]  I'd like to see it.
[47:14.370 --> 47:19.990]  And it wasn't inherently obvious that it was a military base, but it was considered military...
[47:19.990 --> 47:20.610]  It never is.
[47:20.730 --> 47:22.430]  You just creep up on military bases.
[47:26.730 --> 47:27.790]  What time is it?
[47:28.850 --> 47:29.730]  I guess we...
[47:29.730 --> 47:32.270]  Alright, this is probably gonna be maybe the last question.
[47:34.610 --> 47:40.230]  How much of your urban exploring do you think could have been used as squats or suitable for the Rent for Youth of America?
[47:42.150 --> 47:43.790]  Actually, I've squatted before.
[47:44.290 --> 47:48.450]  Just because, you know, I didn't want to pay a hundred bucks for a hotel room for the night.
[47:48.570 --> 47:52.430]  And also, I wanted... I had to do my exploring during the daytime because you get better light.
[47:52.730 --> 47:59.790]  And I wanted to get the maximum amount of time to explore in, so I found... Laura and I found a place to sleep.
[47:59.790 --> 48:07.450]  And we brought a sleeping bag, a pillow, and wedged ourselves in a room and kind of nodded out for the night.
[48:07.590 --> 48:09.210]  And woke up in the morning and continued exploring.
[48:09.530 --> 48:13.370]  It kind of had a creepy homeless feeling to it, but I guess it was kind of cool.
[48:14.330 --> 48:14.730]  Thanks.
[48:15.430 --> 48:18.590]  I just want to say thanks for having us here at the HOPE conference.
[48:18.690 --> 48:18.810]  Yeah, thanks a lot.
[48:18.810 --> 48:22.790]  It's our first time ever being at the... as a speaker at HOPE.
[48:22.790 --> 48:31.810]  And I appreciate... anyone has any other questions, concerns, comments, or whatever, if you go to our website, lioddities.com, you can just email editor.
[48:31.970 --> 48:34.310]  There's a thousand links on all the pages, and that's us.
[48:34.410 --> 48:35.410]  So, we'll get the email.
[48:35.910 --> 48:36.530]  Thank you.
[48:36.930 --> 48:38.130]  Thank you.