Bob Chats with Haunted Highway’s Dana Workman: SyFy Channel’s Hottest New Investigator
You know, I’ve always fancied myself as not having a fear for many things. Okay, there’s the dislike of bats (fear is such a nasty word), I’ll give you that one. But watching the new SyFy Channel show Haunted Highway has introduced me to a level of fear I’ve never considered before. Maybe I’m just getting old but watching these two person teams search for paranormal anomalies while on their own in the wilderness freaks me out. And to make it worse, Dana Workman, the subject of my interview today and one of the investigators on the show, is a beautiful, petite young woman. So what does that say about me? I bet I can at least take her in arm wrestling though. Enough about me. Let’s learn about my new hero…
Bob: With me on the phone today is the lovely, multi-talented, and either incredibly crazy or incredibly courageous co-host of the SyFy channel original series, Haunted Highway, Miss Dana Workman. Dana, how are you this morning?
Dana: That was quite the intro. I like it!
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Bob: I’m scared for you everytime I watch the show. You’re like the girl in the horror movie who tells her friends, “You stay here, I’ll go down and check the basement”.
Dana: Yeah, except this is real. I usually scare the living daylights out of myself. I spend 98% of the show having the crap scared out of me.
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Bob: Well you hide it really well. Dana, for those folks who may not have had a chance to see Haunted Highway yet, can you give them a glimpse of what to expect when they tune in?
Dana: Yeah, it’s Jack Osbourne and I as well as 2 other investigators, another team. We go to to paranormal hotspots around the country. It’s all self-documented, meaning, we are the camera people, and we’re essentially alone out there in the woods trying to find…we’re more creature oriented so not so much haunted hospitals and ghosts but more like The Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot. So you get two city folks who are highly interested in this stuff trying to conduct their own investigations. We have all the proper tools and equipment to use. We have a really expensive flir camera and also infrared cameras. It’s pretty neat and pretty terrifying at the same time.
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Bob: First episode, Jack decides that the two of you are probably not going to catch a glimpse of the Bear Lake Monster while sitting in the boat so he decides to don scuba gear and go down 70 feet to some caves looking for it. What is going through your mind as you see him go overboard and you’re stuck, in the middle of a lake, in the dark, with a possible sea serpent floating around you.
Dana: He’s nuts. We’re both nuts. Doing a scuba dive at night. There’s so much stuff that we filmed and that we got on camera that’s so hard to squeeze into a twenty two minute episode. As soon as he hit the water that night, the craziest windstorm I’ve ever seen kicked up. It was scary. I was battling the winds on the boat and he was in the water by himself. I mean, he did find some pretty interesting things shockingly enough. But yeah, it gets rough out there.
I absolutely love this stuff and have had an interest in it all my life. I was thrilled to do the show. But with that comes a little bit of fear and uncertainty and not too much safety. We’re kind of out there on our own.
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Bob: That’s the part that amazes me. You’re looking for a creature and see a thermal image on the equipment of something off in the distance. You say , “I’m going to go get a closer look” and you just keep going forward.
Dana: Your instincts kind of battle each other. I dealt with that the entire show. Part of my instinct says, “Get the hell out of there” and the other part is, well the whole reason we’re there is to find the thing. It’s a fight or flight type of thing.
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Bob: It’s one of those things though where you have to watch what you wish for because if you do find it, well, who knows?
Dana: Yeah, completely. It’s so funny because the things that scare me are also what interest me the most.
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Bob: Then this job must keep things very interesting.
Dana: Yeah, it does! I’m really interested in things like natural disasters, tsunamis, earthquakes and always the paranormal. Really any type of unexplained phenomenon. But I’m interested in it probably because it terrifies me. This is a really, really, awesome, cool show to get to do. And I do thank my lucky stars that I’m still here today and able to talk about it.
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Bob: You are a survivor. Going back to the first show, at one point the walkie talkies malfunctioned and Jack was out of communication for quite a while. What was that like waiting? Did the thoughts of what if he doesn’t come back up run through your head?
Dana: Yeah. Always. The what ifs are constant. You’re out in the middle of nowhere on a boat. I wonder if it had something to do with the wind as well. As soon as he hit the water, I’ve never seen wind pick up like that out of nowhere. It was creepy actually.
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Bob: Not to mention there might be a giant sea serpent underneath you.
Dana: Yeah. That too! Besides the natural weather dangers, we were in the dark, on a lake where there’s been a long history of sea creature sightings.
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Bob: God bless you. Now, another of the locations you visited was the home of the Shadow People. In that episode, you are sitting there blindfolded, in the dark, under a tree, at a spot where a massacre had happened 200 years earlier and the shadows of the deceased are said to still appear. What was more frightening for you? The fact that the cameras clearly showed a shadow approach and basically spook you or the fact that there was a bobcat right near you. You could have been Meow Mix!
Dana: Oh my God! Filming that entire episode, I think I must have been terrified 98% ot the time. I had such adrenaline filming these episodes because of that. And because I wanted to do it but, I was scared too. You don’t want to mess around with spirits but, at the same time, that’s what I’m out there to find.
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Bob: Or bobcats. That thing was pretty big.
Dana: Yeah. There was a growling in the bushes that night for a couple hours but nothing bothered us.
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Bob: Well, I gotta say, you guys really keep your composure through it all.
Dana: Yeah. At least what they show. I’m sure there’s plenty of time that both of us aren’t quite as cool and collected. But we did pretty well. I was impressed with myself. I’m not going to lie.
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Bob: If nothing else, the names alone from some of the places you visited are the basis for great storytelling down the road. I can hear you now, “I remember when Jack and I were walking through the Devil’s Soup Bowl or we had just crossed Skinwalker’s Ridge when things began to get weird”.. Do you have any input into the locations or paranormal stories you are going to report on?
Dana: Here and there. It was a collaborative effort. I know they carefully selected some of these places for us. But the Skinwalker Ranch was the most highly anticipated place for both Jack and I to go to. If you look into the history surrounding the ranch and just the area in general in Utah, it’s unbelieveable. I was always really interested in coming here but I can’t believe I actually got to go. There’s definitely some weird things going on there.
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Bob: So you’ve always had a love for adventure and risk taking?
Dana: Yeah. I always loved, actually I was obsessed, more than obsessed with the X-Files. My dad actually went hunting for the Loch Ness Monster.
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Bob: Wow. So then this is in your blood?
Dana: Yeah. I mean it’s a lifelong dream to actually be able to go out and do it.
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Bob: So is there one story or folklore legend that you would personally like to explore?
Dana: The Skinwalker Ranch Place kind of tapped into everything. It was not only these Skinwalker creatures that come from old Indian legends, but it also taps into UFOs and these portals and vortexes. It’s like this area is the Holy Grail for unexplained phenomenon. We can go on and on. It’s a shame we only had 22 minutes to fit all the stuff we got into. That actually tapped into a strong interest I’ve always had in UFOs too.
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Bob: I’m sure having the locals give you their personal eyewitness accounts of things that have gone on has got to add a lot of excitement to being there as well.
Dana: Oh yeah. You talk to these people and they 100%….like I believe that they believe what they are saying is true. They are very normal, down to earth people. You know, this particular area of Utah, every single person had seen something. Whether it was a UFO or Skinwalker Creatures. We talked to this one older couple for a half hour or so. They had moved there and heard all these stories and at first, they were pretty skeptical. They said a year or two later, they started seeing things themselves. That’s probably one of the most interesting facets to all these places is the people that you talk to and look into their eyes while they are telling these stories.
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Bob: So what can we look forward to on future episodes?
Dana: The next show, we went to Las Vegas in search of something that is more a cross between a spirit and an animal. The story behind them, there were these dogs that were basically kept around to guard the mines in the area at the time. When the mines ran out of gold or whatever, they pretty much left these dogs to starve to death or they were just put to death. This town was so creepy! I’m telling you, both Jack and I, when driving in here, were like this place screams of murder!
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Bob: So were these spirit dogs?
Dana: That’s still up in the air. Some people had described seeing something so real as a large coyote and a physical animal but it’s obviously way too big to be a coyote and others see them more as a spirit. So the stories are mixed and I’ve come to wonder if it’s a little bit of both.
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Bob: That seems to be the theme through all the shows so far is that it kind of leaves things open. There are possibilities that these things are true but actually being able to 100% confirm it in a 22 minute segment is a difficult thing to do. But you certainly have come up with things that open your eyes and raise questions.
Dana: Exactly. You know, we’re not trying to sit there and say “I don’t know, I don’t know” but you really don’t. And it does open the door to questions. We don’t have a caged spirit to present you with but we did see a lot of weird stuff out there that we can’t explain.
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Bob: Well seeing that shadow coming toward you in the second episode and then watching you jump as it passed over, I mean I believed. I was kind of surprised when Jack fluffed it off as nothing but I definitely thought something was there.
Dana: Yeah. You know, as open minded as both of us are, we both also have a strong element of skepticism. And It kind of criss-crosses in different areas. I think he’s batshit crazy to think that wasn’t something but, you know?
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Bob: Well you’re the one that actually encountered it directly so I’m siding with you on this one.
Dana: Thank you.
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Bob: Speaking of Jack, we’re talking of course about the son Ozzy and Sharon, the devastating news about his battle with MS was recently announced. Would you please let him know that the thoughts and prayers from all of us here at whysoblu.com go out to him?
Dana: Yeah. Absolutely. Everyone’s been very supportive. He’s got a lot of love around him. He’s a really good guy and I will definitely pass that along.
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Bob: I appreciate that. Earlier today, I mentioned to my son, Graig, that I was interviewing you this afternoon and he knew all about you. He wanted to know if I could ask a question for him. Now he’s exactly like you guys. He’ll go anywhere, do anything. He has no fear that this thing could kill me or eat me or whatever. So what he wants to know is, how does someone get a job like yours?
Dana: Good Question. You know, I’ve been very fortunate. And know, looking back at the events of my life, I think everything has led up to this and it all makes sense. Just keep yourself informed of all the happenings and keep yourself immersed in that world. I ask myself the same question sometimes. Like how in the world did I get here. But, I’m very fortunate and very glad.
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Bob: Well it’s a very cool show.. So when you’re not battling the unseen forces, what do you do for fun?
Dana: I love comedy actually. I go see a lot of stand up. I’m kind of big into the comedy world.
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Bob: That was actually how you started in the business right?
Dana: Kind of, yeah. I was acting when I was younger but I just stuck with that until I realized I didn’t have the passion for it that most people do and I really just love the hosting aspect of things. I kind of wanted to take the comedy route. It’s funny, this show mixes two of my loves although they really don’t show much of the comedy portion of it. When I get nervous, I make jokes. And I was nervous half the time.
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Bob: Any other projects on the horizon?
Dana: I’m working on producing my own show that’s sci-fi oriented and I’m pretty excited about it. I’m sticking to the paranormal.
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Bob: Are you free to divulge any information on it?
Dana: Not yet, Definitely way too early.
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Bob: One final question before I let you go. The raspberry shakes at Bear Lake, were they really that good?
Dana: Those things were really good. I’m not gonna lie. I mean all the people talked about were those raspberry shakes!
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Bob: They must have been delicious if they took top billing over their local Sea Serpent. I will have to try one someday. Dana, on behalf of myself and whysoblu.com, I’d just like to say thanks so much for taking the time out of your busy day. I truly enjoyed our time and wish you all the best with the show and your future sci-fi project. Before I let you go, and this is the dad in me coming out, for God’s sake be careful out there!
Dana: Thanks! I will. It was a pleasure.
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