Nick Groff and Katrina Weidman investigate their biggest building yet on tonight’s Paranormal Lockdown — and uncover a secret that’s been hidden inside the imposing Statler City hotel in Buffalo, NY, for decades.
The looming 18-story building was a favorite haunt of the great and the good in days of yore, including Elvis Presley, Richard Nixon and mobsters like Al Capone.
In later years it has seen repeated reports of unexplained phenomenon, including an apparition which recently appeared in a photo taken by wedding guests.
Nick and Katrina endure a 72-hour lockdown in a bid to get to the bottom of the mysteries buried within the legendary building’s walls.
One of their focuses is the link between the former hotel’s glitzy Terrace Room and the dilapidated Turkish Bath which lies directly underneath it.
They also investigate the Rendezvous room where they use thermal imaging and a state-of-the-art Portal Wonder Box developed by paranormal expert Steve Huff to try and pick up presences.
Not long after they enter, things become interesting when they hear a noise coming from one side of the empty room.
Katrina starts to feel as if it’s “crowded” and says that she feels like she’s “walking through waves of people”.
The building in Buffalo, part of the Statler Hotel chain founded by Ellsworth Statler, was built in 1923 and was the second Statler building to be erected in the city.
READ: Meet the creator of the GeoBox and GeoPort spirit boxes used on Paranormal Lockdown
It closed as a hotel in 1984 and most of its floors lay empty for many years. A renovation attempt to turn it into a hotel and condos fell apart in the late 2000s, and it was auctioned in 2010.
It is now undergoing another refurb under the new owner, who acquired it in March 2011.
But with its past links to the mafia, what Nick and Katrina find is a story that’s dying to get out…
Paranormal Lockdown airs Fridays at 9/8c on TLC.