Unauthorized Adventurers Abound Nationwide
Belief:
Atheism and Diversity: Is It Wrong For Atheists To Convert Believers?
Greta Christina
Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace:
Don't Fear the Deficit Bogeyman
John Miller
DrugReporter:
The War on Weed: Marijuana Is Basically Harmless -- The Monumentally Stupid Drug War Is Not
Jim Hightower
Environment:
White House Garden Won't Make Up for Obama's Nomination of Pesticide Lobbyist for US Chief Agriculture Negotiator
Jill Richardson
Food:
Don't Be Scared of Food: Are We Being Needlessly Hysterical About Food Safety?
David E. Gumpert
Health and Wellness:
47,000 Women Could Die As a Result of the New Mammogram Guidelines
George Lakoff
Immigration:
Republican Playbook on Immigration Debate Long on Emotions, Short on Facts
Mary Giovagnoli
Media and Technology:
The Memory Scrub About Why Ft. Hood Happened Is Almost Complete ... If It Weren't for Archives
Mark Ames
Movie Mix:
Disney Apocalypse: Why 2012 Sucks
Alexander Zaitchik
Politics:
White House's Ties to Health Care Industry Deeper Than Visitor Records Show
Daniela Perdomo
Reproductive Justice and Gender:
Why Can't We Look Away From Sarah Palin?
Vanessa Richmond
Rights and Liberties:
Whatever Happened to the CIA Black Sites?
David Corn
Sex and Relationships:
Hot Mormon Muffins and Models for Jesus: What's With All the Sexy Christians?
Liz Langley
Take Action:
G-20 Meetings: Nothing Much Happened in the Suites, and There Was Too Much Punch in the Streets
Laura Flanders
Water:
Poseidon's Financial Shell Game: Why Is a Private Desalination Plant Asking for Public Money?
Peter Gleick
World:
Is Obama Following in the Footsteps of Bill Clinton?
Jeff Cohen

Tristan Savatier peers into a labyrinth of machinery illuminated only by stars. He navigates through the darkness of the abandoned French Renault factory, following his friends into a deserted control room, dusty from years of neglect. Apprehensive that police will break up the expedition, they nevertheless continue, turning the corner to discover discarded gas masks and deteriorating blueprints of a steam-powered generator. After snapping pictures, Savatier and his entourage leave the factory, slipping into the cover of darkness.
Savatier is not your typical intruder; he is an urban explorer, a member of a growing subculture gaining adherents around the globe. From abandoned subway tunnels to deserted mental asylums, urban explorers venture into the most obscure recesses of metropolitan landscapes to discover forbidden settings and photograph their findings.
Savatier said he is interested in the element of mystery prohibited locations present. "If a door says, 'No Trespassing,' there might be something behind it that's interesting," he said.
Urban explorers undertake extreme exploits, fueled by the notion that "off-limits" is an arbitrary term. Urban explorer Julia Solis once hosted a formal dinner for 40 guests in an abandoned underground subway tunnel near the Brooklyn Bridge, according to an Oct. 15 article in the San Francisco Independent. In another adventure, Solis entered the deserted Northampton Hospital in Massachusetts, where she said "the morgue had a stained autopsy table, vials and test tubes. The refrigerator trays for the bodies still had blood on them."
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| More News and Analysis: | ||
|
Republican Playbook on Immigration Debate Long on Emotions, Short on Facts Immigration: Senate Republicans have “thoughtfully’ provided immigration advocates with their strategy for opposing immigration reform in 2010. By Mary Giovagnoli, Immigration Impact. November 27, 2009. |
Lou Dobbs Suddenly Loves Illegal Immigrants? Clearly He's Eyeing Public Office Politics: Dobbs said he now favors the very legalization process for unauthorized immigrants that he's long derided as a brain-dead "amnesty". By Joshua Holland, AlterNet. November 26, 2009. |
Whatever Happened to the CIA Black Sites? Rights and Liberties: The CIA ordered its secret prisons closed, but lawyers for terrorism suspects want them preserved as possible evidence -- and the CIA won't say what's going on. By David Corn, Mother Jones. November 26, 2009. |
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