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A BBC special starring Michael Parkinson was so terrifying and realistic that it traumatised the nation, leaving kids suffering from PTSD and inducing labour in pregnant women.

Ghostwatch, a mockumentary, was released on Halloween night in 1992 and has never been repeated on UK television since.

The show drew a huge audience of 31million viewers but many of those didn’t realise that the pseudo-documentary had actually been scripted and recorded weeks before.

Read more: 'Child ghost' caught on camera in abandoned cottage by stunned paranormal investigators

What came next was national hysteria, the effects of which are still being felt three decades later.

Ghostwatch was presented to the audience as a live paranormal investigation and it managed to dupe viewers with the acting, shaky cameras and carefully-scripted storyline.

Although it was aired as a drama and had writers' credits at the beginning, viewers were convinced it was real.

The 90-minute long drama, written by Stephen Volk, investigated reports of a poltergeist in a Northolt home in west London. Viewers were even prompted to call in with their own ghost stories.

Not just a 'jolly good prank'

Volk has previously said he was inspired to write the documentary after being scared by ghost stories on the BBC and claimed Ghostwatch was not designed to be a hoax.

He told Yahoo Movies: “It wasn’t our aim to fool all of the audience all of the running time or to upset people – it was me simply wanting to scare the audience as I’d been (pleasurably) scared by BBC TV ghost stories over the years.

“Ghostwatch in any case, wasn’t designed purely as a hoax or gag. You don’t get £700,000 out of BBC Drama by saying, this will be a jolly good prank! Yes, the number of people ‘fooled’ was a surprise, but what was more interesting to me was the idea that they had been made to feel a mug ‘by the BBC’. That’s really what made them angry.

“Strangely, children had a more malleable attitude to what they were being told, they could accept the manipulation. Adults couldn’t. The optimum age to see Ghostwatch seems to be about 12. People who were 12 years old at the time seem to be the ones who’d come up and tell me how much they loved it. They were utterly terrified, yes – traumatised, even, they’d say – but loved it.”

Ghostwatch follows host Michael Parkinson alongside Mike Smith speaking to paranormal expert Dr. Lin Pascoe, who attempts to explain the events in the house.

Children's presenter Sarah Greene also starred as the on-scene reporter going around the house with the camera crew, while Red Dwarf's Craig Charles carried out interviews with neighbours.

The family living in the haunted home told presenters they'd been haunted by a ghost called Pipes, whose identity was later revealed as the disturbed spirit of a child molester called Raymond Tunstall, who previously lived in the house.

Over the course of the show, one of the young girls who lived in the house is possessed and a ghostly figure is spotted at a number of spots.

One horrifying scene sees scratch marks appear on the young girls' faces, while strange noises can be heard and objects seen moving by themselves.

Thousands of complaints

No one could have predicted what would happen after the drama was aired as many of the viewers, including Parkinson’s own mother, believed it to be real.

The BBC received more than 30,000 complaints including a woman who claimed it induced her labour.

The complaint was not upheld by what is now Ofcom but the broadcaster imposed a 10-year ban on the show.

Lesley Manning, the director of Ghostwatch, previously told the Guardian that a woman asked for compensation to buy her husband new trousers after he soiled the ones he was wearing while watching the show.

However, Manning added that she “didn’t set out to cause mass hysteria” as she thought “the fact that it was a drama was obvious.”

She said: “I definitely didn’t set out to cause mass hysteria. But I wasn’t trying to make it look like a conventional BBC movie, either. I thought the fact that it was a drama was obvious: it was trailed as such by the continuity announcer, and it opened with a “written by” credit.”

The show was also blamed for several cases of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in children and this was confirmed in a 1994 report in the British Medical Journal which detailed cases of kids suffering from the disorder in the wake of the programme, reports The Sun.

The parents of an 18-year-old with learning difficulties also blamed the show for his death.

Factory worker Martin Denham took his own life days after the programme was aired and he was said to be "hypnotised and obsessed" with Ghostwatch, and was convinced there were ghosts within their own family home.

He left a note that read: “If there are ghosts I will be… with you always as a ghost”.

The Denham family argued to the Broadcasting Standards Commission (BSC) that Ghostwatch had caused their son’s death.

In their ruling, the commission found that “the BBC had a duty to do more than simply hint at the deception it was practising on the audience.

"In Ghostwatch there was a deliberate attempt to cultivate a sense of menace.”

The BSC also found that Ghostwatch was excessively distressing and graphic, and stated that “the presence in the programme of presenters familiar from children’s programs… took some parents off-guard in deciding whether their children could continue to view.”

Following the BSC ruling, the BBC issued an apology and the solicitor representing the broadcasting giant also spoke following Martin's inquest.

Aideen Hanley said: "Naturally the BBC and especially those connected with the making of the Ghostwatch programme have already expressed their sympathy in a letter sent by the executive producer."

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• Paranormal investigators left terrified by 'growling hobgoblin' in 'eerie' churchyard

• BBC
• Halloween
• Ghosts
• Christmas
• Family
• London

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