Been There/Done That

Lock Down

by Ptah Gabrie

Through Nov. 3, 7-11 p.m. or midnight, $20-$30, Eastern State Penitentiary, 2124 Fairmount Ave., 215-763-6483, www.easternstate.org

The designers of Eastern State's "Terror Behind the Walls" haunted Halloween attraction have headed to the creepy prison's even creepier Cellblock Twelve for this year's featured addition, "Lock Down." The building has become a source of ghostly interest after the Sci-Fi Channel's Ghost Hunters captured an eerie black apparition moving quickly through the darkness in a second floor walkway. Fuzzy or not, the footage (which I viewed on YouTube) was unnerving.

The most notable special effects in "Lock Down" are the Tesla coils, which produce 3-foot arcs of electricity and illuminate the metal bars and cell doors. The deafening buzz of the coils randomly sounding off at maximum volume kept me on my toes, and at times coincided perfectly with a strong blast of air on my back. Admittedly, I was already terrified by the time I made it to this point. Upon entering, I was met at every blind corner by angry "inmates" dressed in gruesome costumes. In the end, the good old-fashioned zombie prisoners — not the giant electric coils — got the best of me.