Certainly no white knuckled thrill ride like Gunner, but a somewhat odd experience with the authorities:
There were two groups of us hitting up Ridge Home, an abandoned asylum of sorts in Arvada, CO (long gone). We entered from opposite ends of the property, exploring various smaller buildings until we met at the main training facility in the center of the grounds.
We ended up in the sub-levels of the training building - about a mile worth of pipe-lined hallways and rooms partitioned by chain linked fence containing terrifying implements of psychiatric days of yore. This was certainly not my first rodeo, but there was shit in that basement that dropped my jaw. But I digress...
We came to a staircase back up to the main level. As the first of us ascended the stairs, he was flooded with blinding light and someone shouted 'Don't Run!'
A single CSP officer sat all ten of us down there in the hallway. Usual schtick - looking at IDs, told us we weren't supposed to be there, etc., etc. Nice guy and, most importantly, wasn't interested in writing ten trespassing tickets. He had us all stand up and follow him out of the building. He stood by the door as we single filed outside. A few paces out, turn around, the dude's gone.
We stood, confused, within the fenced perimeter by at least 100 yards in every direction. We had to walk by the buildings we had explored on the way in to get out. Not sure if this was the laziest (and least cautious) CSP officer in history, or if he was hoping we'd succumb to temptation...

We also had a strange encounter at a cemetery involving the some very bored DPD cops, including the damned helicopter. Sitting, smoking pot in the darkness and the ghetto bird shines his rays right on us. Of course, we scatter to the bushes and trees. We all knew this graveyard very well. It's covered in foliage and evasion is easy. Working towards the entrance of the graveyard, I spot a squad car. And another. And another. And another, until I had no choice but to retreat back into the graveyard. Four squad cars and a ghetto bird chasing five stoned teenagers in a graveyard. Tax dollars at work. We eventually lost interest and left them to their search.

Well my first experience with law enforcement (UE Related) happened 2 days ago at an abandoned mental hospital. While exploring a building I noticed a guy and girl on the roof who I waved to. Later while I was on the same roof I hear sirens below. I make my way downstairs to find the guy in the hallway. He starts to run from me thinking I'm a cop but I stop him. He explains he was tagging inside and state police got his friend, so he ran inside to avoid prosecution. Now he's asking me for hand wipes, and we're both stuck inside surrounded by cops. After a few close calls diving to the floor to avoid being seen, we both escape. He ran into the woods, while I just casually walked away since they had no idea I was even inside. I see the girl talking to the cops- who turned out to be public safety SMH....As I'm walking up to them the car drives away and I talk to the girl telling her what happened, and she's like ya they were really nice and were going to let us go my friend is an idiot. Haha so I'm like ya he's in the woods good luck!

So far the only encounter I have had was when we were upstairs filming for a video. My friend yells my name because I wandered off and an officer was sitting in his car, parked directly below the window my friend was standing by. The cops windows were open so he had to have heard my friends shout.

We went over to a room on the opposite side of the place and waited it out. About a half an hour later, the police officer was gone. We were never given any second thought by that officer. I kind of believe he was on post and didn't feel like dealing with trespassers.

Just got home from one. Saw some cops pull into a nearby lot while rooftopping.

Protip: if you decide to be an idiot and run from the cops, make sure that all of your buddys are gonna be idiots with you.


There's always that one guy.

I just had a close call with the private security of a construction site yesterday for the first time!

I entered the site at night without any problem (the fence was half-open in the middle) and climbed 12 floors out of 15 with the stairs inside. The stairs stopped at the 12th floor, so I had to climb through the scaffolding outside the building to get to the roof. I thought that nobody will see me from the ground on the 12th floor, but the scaffolding was very bright, so as soon as I walked over it I saw a flashlight pointing at me from the street...
At this point, I had no idea what the protocol was for the security team in this situation: do they try to get inside and chase you? Wait for you at the exit? Do nothing and get back to their TV?
I walked down back to the entrance as soon as I saw the flashlight, but I exited right in front of another security guy. He saw me leaving, I saw him too, but surprisingly he didn't even try to chase me of come talk to me, I just walked away in front of him!

Lesson learned: avoid very bright scaffoldings, even at the 12th floor.
Lesson 2: I could have noticed the second, less visible, scaffolding with a more thorough observation.

At one of the first buildings I went to my friends and I got spotted by security. It was an old factory that didn't have any useable stairs on the first floor. We had to use a rope to climb up the side of the building onto the roof of a first floor room to get in through the second floor. As the last person was just getting to the top, we saw a car driving down the street and then turn around. It turned out to be a security guard who was leaving his shift until he spotted us. He called the cops and waited there with us. Luckily (for us), the response time in that area is horrible. After around forty minutes of waiting, he got tired and let us go.

I was also in an old tower that had just recently started construction with the same group of friends. As we were making our way to the exit, we heard the generators turn on and heard voices. We were able to casually walk out without anyone stopping us.

I've been detained plenty of times. I've always been cool, loosened all muscles, and they've been super nice in return. The only retard experience was when part of a movie crew I was working with accidentally filmed a few hundred yards off the permitted zone. He demanded the IDs of 50 people. It might have been a Ranger officer but not fish and game. Eventually he just cited the producers and I got a full days pay for a few hours. My aunts a cop and I've had a few cop roommates in college. Real cops not campus PD. Most are just regular Joes once they know there's no threat. Anyone can become a security guard so anything goes there.

Maybe this belongs in a separate thread but it kind of belongs here - as I'm traveling out to the States only a few weeks from now I wanted to ask - if you are caught by the police trespassing around derelict places taking photos what is the realistic chance of actually getting arrested for it? Because as far as I understand it varies widely from state to state and even then it depends entirely from officer to officer on the outcome...obviously it depends on the location as well as other factors too but generally speaking how is it?

Coming from the UK where straightforward trespass isn't a criminal offence so rarely if ever results in police involvement, it'd be interesting to know.

Posted by mookster Maybe this belongs in a separate thread but it kind of belongs here - as I'm traveling out to the States only a few weeks from now I wanted to ask - if you are caught by the police trespassing around derelict places taking photos what is the realistic chance of actually getting arrested for it? Because as far as I understand it varies widely from state to state and even then it depends entirely from officer to officer on the outcome...obviously it depends on the location as well as other factors too but generally speaking how is it? Coming from the UK where straightforward trespass isn't a criminal offence so rarely if ever results in police involvement, it'd be interesting to know.

A few weeks ago, my buddy and I were walking down a street a few blocks from some abandoned grain elevators. The police stopped us , searched us, and told us that if were ever caught inside a grain elevator, we will go straight to jail. So I suppose anything can happen around here..

I am digging up this thread to debunk an old myth: private security employees are not always nicer than cops. I have learned that recently during my first, and brief, encounter with our beloved SFPD.

I was climbing a fire escape ladder from the last floor to the roof of an hotel at sunset with two other friends. We were casually taking pictures of the skyline when 10 minutes later a hotel employee appears on the roof and tells us he is going to call the police. Apparently two neighbors called the hotel to report us.

I was aware that private security is not really allowed to detain trespassers, but they locked the fire escape window and the other door, so we were stuck on the roof with them. They were not okay to just let us apologize and leave, and called the police without hesitating. The most pathetic behavior from them was to threaten my two college student friends to call their school principal... They also asked me if I was still in school, I didn't know what difference it would make for them so I just avoided the question.

We were escorted to the lobby where the cops were waiting for us and checked our ID on the spot. They just told up not to it again otherwise we will be charged for trespassing, and we were free to go after 10 minutes. I felt really bad for the cops to have their time wasted for such a mundane thing. After all, they were there just because the hotel security wanted to impress us, in the end we just left and it didn't make any difference for them.

I guess I have to improve my discretion skills for the future, I will wait until the sun sets completely to clime fire escape ladders next time. After all, neighbors can be as watchful as cameras and motion detectors.

I actually may of had my first experience with well I guess "law enforcement" last night, but it was the army or government agencies. Theres a whole write up for it by me in Main under the name "Dayman (Compton Ass Kenny): Enemy of State" ( http://www.uer.ca/...urrpage=1&pp#post0 )

I was just dicking around with my friends late at night and we decided to trek out to this NIKE radar base 35 minutes away thats been closed since 1967(excluding operating as an FAA airtraffic control center for awhile). I had been outside of it twice before; the first time coming 6 months ago and the second time coming 2 months ago. The second time was actually a scouting trip of the building that was derailed by the fact there were contractors working on the front grounds.

Once we got there we were pretty surprised to see the radome illuminated and having an additional red light on the top of the dome. I assumed that maybe the government is just keeping those lights on as the building is up in the hills & it requires those lights to warn planes.

We walked up to the fence and my friends were concerned by the signs saying its an army instillation but I just told them to chill because those signs have always been there and for fucks sake the massive gate on the entry road is open. I start walking towards the open gate which lies about 50ft back from the front fence. My friends start telling me to come back, thinking I intended to enter, so I turn my back to the building and call back and forth to them. We all turn back towards the complex and we all mention that we see this huge light on the side of the concrete tower. But we couldn't decide if it had already been on when we got there. I turn back towards them again while discussing this and eventually turn back towards the building to realize another huge spotlight like light is on. Theres no circle of light cast on me but we all realize both lights are directed at me. Keep in mind at this point I'm standing right behind the line of crossing where the gate would close so I'm a step away from being on the property. The lights were massive on this building and even looked huge given the fact the building was several hundred yards away from me.

We head back to my car, and once we get there we look back towards the building and now 4 spot lights are on and aimed directly at my car, across the street. My car is not aligned with the building at an at all similar angle than where I had been standing thus meaning the lights had followed us. We drove away and once we got a decent distance away we looked back at the building and the whole complex was now completely lit. So basically me and my two friends put an army instillation on alert as part of our casual saturday night. Y'know just typical teenager shit.

My very first time doing anything urbex-related was in April 2012, at this small rehab hospital. I was only doing exterior shots because I was too afraid to step inside at that point (even though it was just crawling through a window), so I spent about 45 minutes taking all sorts of pictures. The hospital is in a very busy residential neighborhood, and sits along an even busier street.

My friend and I are chatting and taking pictures, ignoring all the onlookers thinking we're up to no good and finally finish shooting everything. It was about 4:30 PM by then. As I'm turning back to look at the empty parking lot where employees would park, I see a suspicious white unmarked car slow down and turn down on the street we were right next to. My friend starts freaking out, and I tell her I'll do the talking.

Turns out it was a fire marshall. And a cool one at that. He saw my camera and just wanted to make sure I wasn't trying to set the place on fire. We talked for a bit and he seemed amazed at what I was doing, asking me all sorts of questions. I ask him if he knows anything about the big hospital near downtown, and he tells me all sorts of information about it. He thanked us, and us him, and parted ways.

And to this day, that's the only time I've even come halfway close to running into law enforcement.