• 36 minutes 48 seconds
    189. Cave Diving Horror: 3 Deadly Underwater Cave Exploration Disasters

    From the Maldives Cave System, where five divers entered with no proper permit or certification, of which none survived, to Norway's deepest cave passage, where friends launched an illegal recovery for two men sealed underground, to a flooded Laos gold mine where trapped miners waited 10 days to see the light. Today, we’re covering the disasters connected by the rescue teams determined to recover everyone.

    TW: Drowning

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

    You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

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    20 August 2026, 12:00 am
  • 41 minutes 41 seconds
    188. Camping Horror: The Mysterious Disappearances of Theresa Bier & Madison Scott

    Go to https://kachava.com and use code HSP for 15% off your first order.

    In the summer of 1987, sixteen-year-old Theresa Bier rode into the Sierra Nevada mountains with a 43-year-old man who promised to show her Bigfoot, and only one of them came back. Twenty-four years later and a thousand miles north, twenty-year-old Madison Scott vanished from a crowded campfire party at Hogsback Lake in Vanderhoof, British Columbia, leaving behind her truck, her tent, and a mystery it would take twelve years to crack open. Two campsites, two missing girls, and the question of what… or who… was really waiting in the dark.

    TW: Kidnapping/abduction of a minor, Grooming and alleged sexual abuse of minors, Child abuse and neglect

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

    You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror. 

    13 August 2026, 12:00 am
  • 40 minutes 2 seconds
    187. Amelia Earhart Survived: The Theories Behind The Crash and Newly Discovered Evidence

    Go to https://kachava.com and use code HSP for 15% off your first order.

    On the morning of July 2nd, 1937, Amelia Earhart lifted off from Lae, Papua New Guinea, and flew into the most famous disappearance of the 20th century. The official story says she crashed into the Pacific and sank. And yet, evidence now shows the distress calls kept coming for days, the castaway campsite was discovered on a remote atoll, and a strange shape was spotted on Apple Maps in 2020. Now, with an expedition setting out to finally identify the object buried off Nikumaroro, the mystery of what really happened to Amelia may be about to break wide open.

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

    You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror.

    6 August 2026, 12:00 am
  • 1 hour 3 minutes
    186. Summer Camp Horror, Scary Camping, and Time Slips: Campfire Scary Stories with Sylas Dean

    A rock taken from a ritual site while at summer camp finds its way home… even after being thrown into the ocean. A smiling man in a suit beckons two girls hiking toward a dark treeline. And a voice outside a tent whispers, "Are you inside, girls?" Kaelyn and Sylas read your creepiest true campfire stories: haunted camps, mimics, time slips, and the things waiting in the woods that none of you have been able to explain since. 

    You can Find Sylas Here!

    Socials: https://www.instagram.com/sylasdean/?hl=en & https://www.tiktok.com/@creeptime?lang=en 

    Creeptime The Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/2ETo1REWYsqJgebv5jx5Uy https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/creeptime-the-podcast/id1637005250 

    The Sinister Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/2TPaYb8hS9StH8hokGFvud 

    https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-sinister/id1701665672

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

    You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror.

    30 July 2026, 12:00 am
  • 35 minutes 35 seconds
    185. Shipwreck: A Tale Of Survival and Cannibalism

    In 1864, two ships wrecked on opposite ends of Auckland Island. A frozen, abandoned archipelago south of New Zealand. The Grafton's five-man crew built a cabin, held elections, and taught each other languages for eighteen months. Twenty miles away, the Invercauld's twenty-five-man crew collapsed into starvation and cannibalism, and the one sailor who fought to keep them alive was erased from every published account.

    TW: Cannibalism, mention of animal hunting

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

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    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror. 

    23 July 2026, 12:00 am
  • 39 minutes 52 seconds
    184. Alpine Divorce Horror: Husbands Who Leave Their Wives To Die On Hikes

    Dark Summer Merch Is Here! Get your Tour Tee, Scrapbook Tee or Bandana at ⁠https://shop.heartstartspounding.com/

    Today we’re exploring the term that has been circulating online for the last few months, Alpine Divorce, and two cases where these “divorces” of sorts were life-threatening. In 2012, Toni Henthorn fell from an off-trail ledge in Rocky Mountain National Park. Her husband Harold said she slipped, but a ranger found a map that indicated otherwise. Thirteen years later, Arielle Konig was attacked by her husband, Gerhardt, on a cliffside trail in Hawaii on her birthday, but against all odds, she made it out alive.

    TW: Domestic abuse, mention of sexual assault on a minor, description of head injury

    The National Domestic Violence Hotline is available 24 hours a day at 1-800-799-7233, or text START to 88788.

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

    You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror.

    16 July 2026, 12:00 am
  • 37 minutes 5 seconds
    183. Honeymoon Cruise Disappearance: George Smith

    A newlywed couple boarded a Mediterranean cruise for their honeymoon. Five days later, a teenager photographed blood splattered across a lifeboat canopy, and the groom was gone. His bride says she blacked out. Four men were the last to see him alive. What happened to George Smith puzzled his family for years until they finally started pulling at the threads.

    TW: Mention of SA

    Dark Summer Merch Is Here! Get yours at shop.heartstartspounding.com/

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

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    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror.

    9 July 2026, 12:00 am
  • 35 minutes 8 seconds
    182. Backwoods Horror: The Creatures Appalachians Still Fear

    Across Appalachia, thousands of people keep reporting the same thing: a massive black cat in the woods that screams like a woman being murdered. The government says it doesn't exist, there are NO official reports of big black cats in the area.

    But the Cherokee had a name for what lives in those mountains, and its story is far older, and far more wicked, than a misidentified panther. 

    Today, we’re diving into the stories of The Wampus Cat and Spearfinger.

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

    You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror. 

    2 July 2026, 12:00 am
  • 33 minutes 35 seconds
    181. Mount Everest Horror: The Khumbu Icefall Avalanche

    On April 18th, 2014, a 14,000-tonne block of ice broke free above the Khumbu Icefall and killed sixteen Sherpa guides. It was the deadliest single disaster in Mount Everest's history. What followed wasn't just a rescue. It was a reckoning: a fight over $400 funeral payments, a historic strike, and the first time in ninety years that the world's most famous mountain went silent.

    TW: Mass death, descriptions of fatal injuries 

    For more information on the 2013 Sherpa and Climber conflict, check out Kyle Hates Hiking’s video:

    The EXACT Moment 100 Everest Sherpas Finally SNAPPED (caught on camera)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNpyaGlnjO4 

    If you would like to find out more and donate to the Juniper Fund with me, please find the link here! https://www.thejuniperfund.org/ 

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

    You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror. 

    18 June 2026, 12:00 am
  • 43 minutes 27 seconds
    180. Two Cold Cases Police Thought Would Never Be Solved (And How They Were Cracked This Year)

    They call it the golden age of DNA testing, and this year, two cases that police thought would never be solved finally cracked open. But the answers were nothing anyone expected.

    August 1990, Houston. A white Honda Civic sits abandoned at the end of a cul-de-sac on the city's edge. The keys are in the ignition, a woman's purse is on the floorboard, and blood is smeared down both doors. What detectives find in the woods beyond that car would become known as the Lovers' Lane murders, and the case would go cold for over three decades, broken only by a DNA hit decades later.

    November 1991, Placer County, California. A devoted young mother vanishes mid-morning while cleaning her sister's house, leaving her infant daughter crying in a high chair and her purse the only thing missing. There's no sign of struggle. No witnesses. Just a single cigarette butt on the walkway. When her body is finally found weeks later, the medical examiner makes a discovery more chilling than the murder itself.

    Two cases. Two killers who were never once on police's radar. And two breakthroughs driven by DNA technology that didn't exist when the crimes were committed. 

    CW:  sexual assault, murder, kidnapping, brief references to violence against a child, and suicide.

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

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    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror. 

    11 June 2026, 12:00 am
  • 35 minutes 40 seconds
    179. How Reddit Shut Down the Worst Troubled Teen School in America

    In 1970, a man with no clinical training opened a "therapeutic boarding school" in the Maine woods. For forty-one years, students inside were subjected to organized beatings, forced fight rings, and psychological torture while journalists, state investigators, and even Congress failed to shut it down. 

    Then, in 2010, one anonymous Reddit post did what none of them could.

    TW: Child Abuse, mention of suicide, addiction

    Subscribe on⁠ Patreon⁠ to become a member of our Rogue Detecting Society and enjoy ad-free listening, monthly bonus content, merch discounts and more. Members of our High Council on Patreon also have access to our weekly after-show, Footnotes, where I share my case file with our producer, Matt.

    You can also enjoy many of these same perks, including ad-free listening and bonus content when you subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

    Follow on⁠ Tik Tok⁠ and⁠ Instagram⁠ for a daily dose of horror. 

    4 June 2026, 12:00 am
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