A ghost, or not a ghost - that is the question!?!

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The people present at the time when the shot was taken, seems adamant that there weren't any young girl with long blond hair amongst them in the group. And if you look at the height of the railing it's quite clear it must have been a somewhat small girl, since her head is in level with the railing to the left of her (although the railing does have a sharp upward incline at the end, it can hardly be that high.). Compare it with the height of the women standing on the ascending stair besides her - it reaches her waist.
Either way, it is an interesting photo, if we take the witnesses story at face value.

'Ghosts' Caught On Camera At Famed Stanley Hotel In Colorado

A photograph taken at the Colorado Hotel

The Mausling family of Aurora, Colorado, participated in a “spirit tour” at the 108-year-old Stanley Hotel in Estes Park last month. After returning home, they noticed a photo taken by John “Jay” Mausling that seemed to show a young girl walking down the stairs [MY NOTE: it rather looks to me like she's walking up the stairs, not down].

John Mausling and his wife, Jessica Martinez-Mausling, told HuffPost via email that there were no young girls in their 11-member party or on the tour. 


“At first we tried to be logical and think we somehow missed her so we asked our kids, their girlfriends and our friend if they remembered seeing a little girl,” they wrote. “Nobody did. We do not remember seeing anything on the stairs when we took the picture.”






Here’s a close up of the mysterious figure on the stairs:



Ben Hansen, former FBI agent and host of “Fact or Faked: Paranormal Files,” said; "a careful analysis of the photo turned up no obvious signs of trickery".


“I really like this photo,” Hansen said. “Assuming that it’s not doctored, it ranks up there as one of the best photos of possible paranormal evidence I’ve seen. If it is faked, I’ve got to hand it to them for their level of detail and creativity because there’s usually enough easy signs to suggest hoaxing.”

While the ghostly girl stood out the most, the photo may also feature a second apparition. 
The Mauslings said that at the time the photo was taken, there were just two people on the stairs: the tour guide and someone else on the tour with a cellphone. However, the image shows what could be a third figure, who appears to be walking up the stairs and away from the tour group:



Hansen said he assumed this figure was just another person walking up the stairs with the same motion blur seen around some of the other people in the image. Then he noticed something else;


“- Through the stair railing posts you should see the lower half of this person like you do the tour guide and the shoes of the person on the stairs... but I can’t make out any lower half,” he said.

Hansen added there was no litmus test for a ghost photo so it’s impossible to know for sure just what was in the picture. The Mauslings, for their part, said they don’t necessarily believe in ghosts, but were “open-minded” and didn’t discount that they could exist.

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It's not a ghost...

Well that’s that settled then...

Well that’s that settled then...

Not at Max's expense, but your comment made me laugh so much I accidently spat my tea out over the keyboard

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It's not a ghost...

Soo what gave it away, you think?

Courtesy of the SPR Facebook page, here's a sceptical blog post on "The Worst Ghosts of 2017", including a snippet on this one, claiming that these are just people whose images are blurred because they're moving:
http://hayleyisaghost.co.uk/worst-ghosts-of-2017/

Courtesy of the SPR Facebook page, here's a sceptical blog post on "The Worst Ghosts of 2017", including a snippet on this one, claiming that these are just people whose images are blurred because they're moving:

It is certainly the case that there is a lot of motion blur throughout the picture. For example one or maybe more of the people seated look decidedly transparent, which would be expected in a longish exposure. The only real anomaly that I can detect is not in the photo, but in the witness statements. The photo itself seems neither here nor there, it is what to make of statements by the people present, as to who was located where at the time of the shot. That in turn may be merely selective attention - while we are looking at one thing, we may not see another. Or a lapse of memory. Even in ordinary events, such as a crime scene, witness statements don't always agree. I don't mean this as any sort of verdict, but only that the whole thing sufficiently ambiguous that I don't feel anything definitive can be concluded.

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It is certainly the case that there is a lot of motion blur throughout the picture. For example one or maybe more of the people seated look decidedly transparent, which would be expected in a longish exposure. The only real anomaly that I can detect is not in the photo, but in the witness statements. The photo itself seems neither here nor there, it is what to make of statements by the people present, as to who was located where at the time of the shot. That in turn may be merely selective attention - while we are looking at one thing, we may not see another. Or a lapse of memory. Even in ordinary events, such as a crime scene, witness statements don't always agree. I don't mean this as any sort of verdict, but only that the whole thing sufficiently ambiguous that I don't feel anything definitive can be concluded.

As you say, one cant always count on eyewitnesses a 100% when it comes to discerning details of a scenario/situation. If everyone in that photo said that they absolutely didn't see any kid with long blond hair during that tour, it could lend some more credence. It really is more likely for a witness to remember one particulary eyecathing extraordinary incident in any given situation. If a guy in a clown-suit was rushing down the stairs past the whole group while honking a horn, we can be pretty sure that nearly 100% of them would remember that situation. But if you ask 15 people what colour the wallpaper had in the second room they visited on the tour, you may get 15 different answers - because hardly none of them would have paid any attention to it - since it is a mundane non-event observation most people don't make. That is the real difference between different eyewitness situations.

The photo her has obvious motion blur, as we see in the person moving up the second staircase. But the blond girl there doesn't appear to be moving either up or down. If you look at how she stands, and the posture, you see that her hips doesn't indicate that her left leg is raised up on the next step. It looks like she is simply standing there. So why this motion blur?

It might be that the camera caught her in that particular millisecond where she perhaps was standing on the platform and for some reason just took a step backward down a step and then came to a halt with both feet on the same step. That is more likely than the other way around, since when you walk up a stair you don't place both feet on each step like that. Plus the blur leaves its "trail" from up/forward and down.

But it really looks like a small little blond girl with long hair, with a white dress or pyjamas. But I guess we will never know - and the motion blur, for the whole picture, messes everything up, to the point where it is hard to be definitive about anything. And this little girl might be that "colour of the wallpaper in the second room" that no one really remembers. We'll never know.

Does anybody know what kind of camera was used?  Phone cameras are notorious for producing some creepy glitches that look like ghosts.