Le Vent du Fada

General discussions of issues of the paranormal affecting our community. A place where you can ask questions, and others will offer answers.
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Professor_Higgins
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Le Vent du Fada

Post by Professor_Higgins »

Pardon the lengthy post. I’ll try and keep my future contributions to this board a bit shorter.

Recently, a friend of mine who works as a detective for the Parisian garde municipale forwarded me a collection of police reports hailing from constables of various jurisdictions in southeastern France. These reports detailed an assortment of homicides that have been occurring throughout the French region of Provence, a sizeable area touching the Mediterranean Sea. The murders are grisly crimes of an apparently non-premeditated nature (crimes of "passion", so to speak), in which the victims were mercilessly dispatched – quite viciously butchered in some cases. No forethought or planning appears to have been involved; the perpetrators acted purely upon an arbitrary murderous impulse. Reading the reports, I think what I find most disturbing about these crimes is their casual brutality.

One report from Avignon recounts the murder of a ten year old child by her mother, who apparently walked into the young girl's room one night and chewed the child's wrists open, leaving her to bleed to death in her own bed. Another report, this one from the village of Cotignac, details a man who used an accelerant to speedily burn down two of his neighbors' homes… with the neighbors still inside.

I could continue, but it’d be unnecessary. I have more than forty reports splayed in front of me just like the above two. All from the same region in France: Provence. Each incident was perpetrated by a different person - a seemingly normal man or woman who assaulted and killed those physically nearest to them in homicidal fits of apoplectic hysteria and psychosis. Many times, the murder victims were friends or family members of the perpetrator. Yet, what makes these homicides truly stick out is that the perpetrators were all individuals without criminal records or histories of mental illness. By all accounts, each attack seemed to have been completely frenzied or at random, without any kind of discernable motive, provocation, or reason, leaving French authorities thoroughly perplexed. Even more startling, this doesn’t appear to be the first time that these sorts of killings have happened. My research indicates that outbreaks of random violence recur almost annually in Provence, stretching as far back as the days of the Roman occupation. Always in Provence.

Individually, each of these homicides – while inarguably tragic – is also relatively unremarkable; the kind of mass consumption news that the media spouts for a few days then sweeps aside and forgets. While there initially seems to be little connection between these murders besides their savagery, there is one defining similarity, which is the reason my Paranormal Unit was sent these reports. My friend says he is certain the culprit is not related to possession, nor is it any kind of conventional application of magical invocations or psychical abilities. And my friend is a good judge of such things. What he lacks in book knowledge about the paranormal, he more than makes up for in field experience. He also asserts that background checks of each perpetrator (all of which committed suicide following their acts or have been permanently institutionalized) have convinced him that these are more than simple cases of basic human cruelty. The only thread that seems to tie each murder together is the fact that they all occurred during particularly active periods of the Mistral.

In France, the Mistral is a legendary wind that blows through the region of Provence, and to a lesser degree, Languedoc. It is a cold, dry wind that gusts all the way from northern Europe and through the Rhone Valley down to the Mediterranean. A katabatic or downslope wind, it migrates from the Alps, created when a high pressure system is forced down into a low pressure system by gravity. It blows sporadically for about 100-150 days throughout the year, at random intervals of anywhere from several hours to several weeks at a time. The Mistral can blow at sustained speeds of more than 80 mph; strong enough to lift clay tiles, steal away lawn furniture, uproot crops, and shatter windows with debris. It’s a fierce and violent wind, which the architecture and agriculture of Provence readily reflect. The wind is considered both a blessing and a curse in the area, for it provides cool air in the summer but dries the local vegetation, making the region highly susceptible to forest fires. However, the Mistral has a much more sinister quality. Within France, this howling wind is notorious for having a disturbing effect upon the psyche, causing erratic behavior in some who’ve been exposed to it.

In short, it drives people insane.

The name Mistral means "masterly", which is suiting because the wind allegedly regulates much of the psychology and emotional health of Provence’s inhabitants. Folk wisdom asserts that the incessant howling of the Mistral as it blows through the gaps and hillocks of Provence seems to unhinge the mind, resulting in everything from depression, insomnia, and nightmares to anxiety and psychosis. In fact, legend has it that the Mistral is what ultimately drove Vincent Van Gogh to lunacy, prompting him to slice off his own ear. And the longer the wind blows, the worse people’s reactions are said to become. After ten days of the Mistral’s ceaseless howling, people and animals have been known to kill themselves, though authorities blame these occurrences upon reasons other than the wind. Many poets and writers, from Victor Hugo to Gabriel Garcia Márquez, have attested to madness-inducing wind in their works, and not in a figurative sense. It is my belief – though the evidence is currently scant – that the senseless murders and violence that recurrently plague the region of Provence are being fueled by the Mistral.

The French used to call this wind "Le Vent du Fada" meaning "Idiot Wind" because of its supposed corroding effects on sanity. Whenever the Mistral blows, so it’s said, there always follows a corresponding rash of homicides and suicides, in addition to milder incidents of migraines, aberrant behavior, and rampant depression among the people of Provence. Statistically, it’s been proven that during the Mistral, the incidence of domestic violence, traffic accidents, and road rage noticeably increases, as does the murder rate. There is even record that courts of law in medieval France regarded the Mistral as a mitigating factor when addressing crimes that were committed while the wind was blowing. Furthermore, the Mistral isn’t an isolated phenomenon. Other katabatic winds with a similar influence upon human psychology exist throughout the world. There is the Sirocco of northern Africa, a searing Saharan wind also known to drive men to insanity. Then there is the Sharav of Israel, the Chinook of Canada, the Nor’wester of New Zealand, and the Santa Ana of southern California (these katabatic winds are called “foehn winds” and they are distinctly warm, unlike the cold Mistral). All are winds that have been blamed for suicides, spikes in violent crime, and bouts of temporary madness. I don’t doubt that were I to investigate the police records and historical records of the aforementioned areas, I would notice a similar pattern to the one in Provence, France.

Science has only marginally addressed the issue of madness-inducing winds; a handful of researchers having done some independent studies, here and there. As a result, the phenomenon remains largely unsubstantiated and unexplained, relegated to the theories of a few Climatologists, albeit respectable ones. One Polish study from the 60's noted a rise in heart attacks, strokes, and blood pressure during periods of katabatic wind activity, but little else. While some correlations have been made between katabatic winds and rates of violence/mental derangement, as we in the Parapsychology field well know, a correlation does not equate to causation. Still, promising theories exist. There are studies that indicate infrasounds at certain frequencies can produce headaches, irritability, and general aggression in the people subjected to them. Perhaps, the Mistral, Sirocco, and other katabatic winds operate along a similar premise. Perhaps these "Idiot Winds" blow at a certain frequency that affects human temperament (in their case, generating a violently psychotic reaction rather than simple aggression). Alternately, maybe these winds produce a buildup in positive ions, since high concentrations of positive ions are known to affect brain chemistry (specifically seratonin and melatonin levels; see studies by Dr. Neil Cherry). Additionally, moving air alters the way our bodies exchange heat with our surroundings and affects the blood flow in our skin by applying pressure to the body’s cutaneous blood vessels, dilating and contracting the veins in our skin. Depending on one’s constitution, the effect of this can range from very pleasant to greatly unsettling. Perhaps then, the wind causes abnormal levels of physical distress for some people.

Could any of these explanations perchance provide a non-paranormal explanation for the harmful psychological influence of these winds over the centuries?

The effects of the Mistral surpass those of its cousins in both severity and regularity. Its impact seems inexplicably more extreme than other winds of madness, enough to drive people to kill their loved ones. Why this is I cannot say, though full blown psychotic breaks like the ones I’ve mentioned above are still relatively rare. I believe that the current abilities of science are woefully inadequate to explain the nature of the Mistral. My friend, the French detective, thinks that there is something more afoot, something more than frequencies and electromagnetic fields, and my professional instincts agree with him. The wind-born madness of the Mistral smacks of something more than an aberration of the natural world. Something beyond a simple weather anomaly, like the black snow or raining animals of Charles Hoy Fort. Something powerful and evil. Some kind of elemental force, perhaps. An old, embittered pagan god. An eldritch demon. A secret society of occultists tampering with the climate. I’ve seen too much in my lifetime to rule out such possibilities.

And if the Mistral and other Idiot Winds are orchestrated by a supernatural power, then what are they ultimately designed to accomplish? Why sow madness? If the Mistral blows all across Europe, why does it only seem to have calamitous effects upon reaching Provence, France? Why does it affect some people but not others? And why is the Mistral seemingly more dangerous than the rest? There are too many factors to consider, and my understanding of Meteorology, especially Anomalous Meteorology, is somewhat lacking.

To quote a story by Márquez about maddening wind, “…At the end of two days we had the impression that the wind was not a natural phenomenon but a personal affront aimed by someone at us, and us alone.”

It is my opinion that this topic warrants further investigation.

---Arthur Higgins, Brown University
Last edited by Professor_Higgins on Sun Aug 03, 2008 12:14 am, edited 3 times in total.
"Measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so." ---Galileo Galilei
DarKnyht
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Re: Le Vent du Fada

Post by DarKnyht »

I would say sleep deprivation might be part of it. If the winds gust that fast, I am sure there is a lot of stuff getting picked up by it. I bet a lot of people's sleep is interrupted regularly as small objects hit their homes at 50-60 mph.

Noise pollution has already been shown to cause all sorts of physical problems to people, it may be possible it also causes mental/psychological problems too.

Now as for supernatural causes, are there any legends or myths from the area?
“Whoever starts out toward the unknown must consent to venture alone.” - Andre Gide
Hannah
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Re: Le Vent du Fada

Post by Hannah »

Hello Professor.

I know there are some days and nights out in Montanna where you feel like the wind has specifically singled out you to blow at and torment. It waits for when your off guard then slams into you like a linebacker, knocking you into the snow. Then it dies down again until you pull yourself out of the snowbank before it comes back, driving at you through your soaking wet clothes.

In the summer it waits for when the sun's made you so hot that you've stripepd down and taken a dunk in the swimming hole. Then it races across your bare wet skin, ice cold.

Hannah

PS: The wind here in D.C. doesn't seem like that at all. It seems much less independant, more co-operative. Maybe thats why I could learn to use it before I learned the other stuff.
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Willie Long
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Re: Le Vent du Fada

Post by Willie Long »

I heard that "witchwinds" made people sick because of their positive ion charge.
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