The SMK Pengkalan Chepa 2 mass possession outbreak

SMK Pengkalan Chepa 2 is a state secondary school in Kota Bharu district, Kelantan, Malaysia. It stands in the Pengkalan Chepa area, about 8 km from Kota Bharu town. In April 2016 it had 1,044 pupils. The trouble began on Monday 11 April 2016. Some reports give 12 April.

It started with one girl. Raja Nor Athirah, 17, a Form 5 pupil, said she saw a pocong standing in an empty classroom. The shroud-wrapped ghost of Malay folklore. Both her hands went numb. Her mind was confused. Nik Nor Awadah Rohairul, 15, put it plainly: "First both my hands went numb, then the world felt dark and chaotic." Several pupils later said they photographed a white shrouded figure at the canteen, the hall and in classrooms on a Saturday night.

Principal Siti Hawa Mat told reporters that all the victims said they had seen the same black figure. Pupils called it the lembaga hitam. Black. Hairy. Ugly-faced. It was seen in empty classrooms and the girls' toilets. Some said it was stalking the corridors. Some said it pursued them. One pupil reportedly took a picture of it, and the photo spread on social media.

The teachers felt it too. Norlelawati Ramli, 32, a PE teacher, held an affected pupil and felt an unusual heaviness. "I felt as if I was being pulled," she said. "I immediately recited Ayat Kursi." Later it was as though someone was hanging onto the left side of her body. She saw flashes of black like a black figure. Kamariah Ibrahim, 48, a chemistry teacher, said: "I felt something trying to enter my body." Her head felt swollen. She was numb and kept crying. After an hour of reciting Ayat Kursi, her head felt lighter.

By 14 April more than 50 pupils and eight teachers had been badly affected. From Thursday 14 April the pupils were sent on special leave. Islamic healers came in and said some parts of the grounds were spiritually heavy. There were Quran and Surah Yasin readings, dhikr and prayers. On Sunday 17 April the school reopened after a two-hour Quran recital. Reporters outside the compound heard screams from inside the grounds. By then more than 110 pupils and teachers had been affected.

Between about 17 and 27 April, three schools within 5 km reported cases: SMK Pengkalan Chepa 1, SMK Kemumin and SMK Kubang Kerian 3. The Kelantan Education Department sent counsellors. On 19 April its deputy director, Jaafar Ismail, said the outbreak was under control and spoke of isolated cases.

May 2016. At about 10 am on a school day, girls started screaming for no apparent reason. The hysteria spread from class to class. Then the boys followed suit. More than 40 pupils were affected. Almost 1,000 were sent home. Two ambulances took pupils to a clinic. The school brought in bomohs.

Medical sociologist Robert E. Bartholomew believed the viral photo of the black figure set it off, combined with belief in spirits. "It can look very real like somebody is possessed at the time, but it is in fact psychological." Simon Wessely of King's College London counted it among hundreds of similar Malaysian episodes over 30 years. Prof. Mohamed Ghouse Nasuruddin of Universiti Sains Malaysia disagreed, urging readers not to dismiss the unexplainable. "Our existence is a complex conundrum of scientifically proven and esoteric phenomena." The photo was never authenticated. No one was ever accused of faking it.