November 23, 2016 10:37 am
By

666

The world is full of culturally rich sites and landmarks that make for incredible tourist attractions. Whether you’re looking to enjoy vistas of the countryside, to embark on wild adventures along sandy seascapes, or to mingle with the locals flourishing cities…you name it, the planet has it. But for every beautiful place, there’s another that has, sadly, fallen into disrepair.

Whether they were abandoned after a brutal war or because of financial issues, these are 5 ghost towns that were once thriving locations and have become some of the spookiest places in the world. Take a look.

1. Kolmanskop, Namibia

This town burst to life in the early 1900s during Africa’s great diamond rush. It had a residential development, a school, a hospital, and even a casino.

But when diamond sales plummeted after World War I, Kolmanskop was abandoned, and by the 1950s it was overtaken once more by sand.

2. Prypiat, Ukraine

Located in the “zone of alienation” in northern Ukraine, this town is what nearly 50,000 residents used to call home before the tragic 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

2_3

Chernobyl is still considered one of the worst disasters in history.

3. San Zhi, Taiwan

3_1

This city in Northern Taiwan was supposed to house a futuristic pod village that served as a luxury vacation retreat.

3_2

Unfortunately, production abruptly stopped due to tragic construction accidents and limited funding, and the site’s bad reputation seems to have deterred anyone from restarting the doomed project.

4. Craco, Italy

4_1

Dating back to at least 1060, the medieval town of Craco rises from the rolling hills of southern Italy, about 25 miles inland from the Gulf of Taranto.
4_3

Despite close ties to the ever-powerful Church, Craco suffered from poor farming conditions, earthquakes, landslides, and wars.

4_3

By 1963, all of its 3,000-plus inhabitants had emigrated to a nearby areas or to North America, leaving behind a beautiful, crumbling city.

5. Oradour-sur-Glane, France

5_5

On June 10, 1944, during World War II, German troops barged into the small village of Oradour-sur-Glane to punish its inhabitants for supporting the French resistance. The village’s men were shuffled into barns, where they were shot in the legs to guarantee agonizingly slow deaths, while the women and children were slaughtered by soldiers wielding machine guns as they attempted to escape the church. The village was destroyed, and 642 in all people perished. And the worst part? The Germans invaded the wrong town. Oradour-sur-Glane remains a horrific reminder of the atrocities that occurred.

Categorised in:

This post was written by Nadia Vella