Authorities in New Mexico are conducting an extensive search for a retired U.S. Air Force general who disappeared from his home nearly three weeks ago.
Retired Maj. Gen.William "Neil" McCasland, 68, was last seen on the morning of Feb. 27 at his residence in Albuquerque, New Mexico, the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office said ina statement. His wife reported him missing later that day after returning home from a medical appointment to find he was gone, leaving behind his phone, glasses, and other personal items.
Following McCasland's disappearance, local authorities issued aSilver Alert, which is an advisory for a missing person who is 50 or older and has an "irreversible deterioration of intellectual faculties," according to the New Mexico Department of Public Safety. The sheriff's office initially reported that the alert was issued for McCasland due to unspecified "medical issues."
During anews conferenceon March 16, the sheriff's office said the Silver Alert remained in effect and had been issued because McCasland previously reported that he was experiencing a "mental fog." But Lt. Kyle Woods of the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office underscored that investigators do not believe McCasland was cognitively impaired at the time of his disappearance.
"There's no indication, and we are not putting forward that Mr. McCasland was disoriented, confused," Woods said. "Arguably, he would still be the most intelligent person in the room that any of us would be in. Highly intelligent, highly capable, but that information was given to us early on, and out of an abundance of caution, we escalated to a silver alert to try to garner as much public attention as possible to try to help locate him as soon as possible."
The sheriff's office said there were still no confirmed sightings of McCasland and reiterated that there is currentlyno evidence of foul play. The case remains an active missing-person investigation.
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Timeline of William McCasland's disappearance
A repairman interacted with McCasland at his home at around 10 a.m. local time on Feb. 27, according to atimeline released by the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office.
McCasland's wife, Susan McCasland Wilkerson, left for a medical appointment at about 11:10 a.m. and returned shortly after noon to find him gone, the sheriff's office said. He left behind his phone, prescription glasses, and wearable devices at the residence.
After attempting to contact family and friends, McCasland Wilkerson reported him missing at about 3:07 p.m., and the investigation began immediately, according to the sheriff's office.
Investigators later determined several items appeared to be missing from the residence, including his hiking boots, a wallet, and a .38-caliber revolver with a leather holster, the sheriff's office said. Investigators believe he may have been wearing a light green long-sleeve outdoor shirt at the time of his disappearance.
On March 7, a gray U.S. Air Force sweatshirt was discovered about 1.25 miles east of the home and prompted additional search efforts in the area, the sheriff's office said. Authorities said the sweatshirt has not been confirmed to belong to McCasland, and initial testing detected no blood.
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The Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office said investigators have conducted extensive search operations involving drones, helicopters, K-9 teams, and volunteer search crews.
Investigators have also expanded a neighborhood canvass to more than 700 homes while requesting security camera footage that could help determine whether McCasland left the area or indicate a direction of travel, the sheriff's office said.
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Despite those efforts, investigators have not identified any confirmed sightings or videos showing McCasland "leaving the area or indicating a direction of travel," according to the sheriff's office.
The sheriff's office described McCasland as an avid outdoorsman who frequently hikes, runs, and cycles in Albuquerque's Northeast Heights and the Sandia foothills. McCasland is 5 feet, 11 inches tall and weighs about 160 pounds. He has white hair and blue eyes.
Investigators are asking residents and local businesses to review security camera footage from Feb. 27 and Feb. 28, particularly from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Feb. 27, and submit any possible sightings. They are also asking hikers and others who were in the Sandia foothills during that time to review GoPro or cellphone recordings that might have captured McCasland.
Anyone who believes they see McCasland is urged to call 911 immediately, authorities said. The FBI's Albuquerque field office is assisting the investigation, though the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Office remains the lead agency in the case.
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McCasland's Air Force career and Wright-Patterson role
McCasland was the commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, according to his Air Force biography. He managed a $2.2 billion science and technology program, as well as $2.2 billion in additional customer-funded research and development.
He joined Wright-Patterson in 2011 andretired in 2013, reported theCincinnati Enquirer, part of the USA TODAY Network. The Dayton Air Force base was home to Project Blue Book in the 1950s and 1960s, according to "The Air Force Investigation into UFOs" published by Ohio State University.
During that time, it logged 12,618 UFO sightings, with 701 of those remaining "unidentified." The U.S. government created the project because of Cold War-era security concerns and Americans' obsession with aliens.
Because of McCasland's leadership role at Wright-Patterson, his disappearance has prompted speculation online about possible connections to classified programs,according to the Cincinnati Enquirer.
Earlier this month, McCasland Wilkersonshared a statement on social mediato "dispel some of the misinformation circulating" about her husband and his disappearance. She said after his retirement, McCasland briefly worked on UFO-related projects by Tom DeLonge, a UFO researcher and guitarist for the band Blink-182.
"It is true that Neil had a brief association with the UFO community through Tom DeLonge, former frontman for Blink-182 and founder of the organization To The Stars,"McCasland Wilkerson wrote. "Neil worked with Tom for a bit shortly after his Air Force retirement as an unpaid (Neil's choice) consultant on military and technical/scientific matters to lend verisimilitude to Tom's fiction book and media activities."
She also noted that McCasland did not have "any special knowledge about the ET bodies and debris from the Roswell crash stored at Wright-Patt" and that it "seems quite unlikely that he was taken to extract very dated secrets from him."
Contributing: Chad Murphy, Cincinnati Enquirer
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY:Retired US Air Force major general missing for weeks: What we know
