Retired Maj. Gen. William Neil McCasland, a former commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, walked out of his Albuquerque home on February 27, 2026, and has not been seen since. He left behind his phone, glasses, and every device that could track him. Nearly a month later, the FBI has joined the search, a Silver Alert remains active, and online speculation has surged as the missing Wright-Patterson general’s case draws attention from a Missouri congressman, a former FBI agent, and people who connect his disappearance to his former command of one of the most storied laboratories in American military history.
TL;DR: Retired Air Force Maj. Gen. William “Neil” McCasland, 68, a former commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, walked out of his Albuquerque, New Mexico, home on foot on February 27, 2026, and has not been seen since. He left behind his phone, glasses, and wearable devices. The FBI joined the search in mid-March. McCasland’s name resurfaced in UFO discourse after leaked 2016 emails between Blink-182 musician Tom DeLonge and former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta named him as an adviser on UFO-related projects. His wife has disputed the UFO connection. Authorities say there is no evidence of foul play, but McCasland remains missing as of late March 2026. Sources linked below.
Timeline
1917 Wright-Patterson Air Force Base established near Dayton, Ohio, eventually becoming home to the Air Force Materiel Command and the Air Force Research Laboratory.
July 1947 An object crashes on a ranch near Roswell, New Mexico. The wreckage is reportedly transported to Fort Worth Army Air Field and, according to some accounts, to Wright Field (now Wright-Patterson). The official explanation is a weather balloon from Project Mogul.
1947 to 1969 The U.S. Air Force investigates 12,618 UFO sightings through three successive programs headquartered at Wright-Patterson: Project Sign (1947 to 1949), Project Grudge (1949 to 1952), and Project Blue Book (1952 to 1969). Of the total, 701 cases remain unidentified when the program closes, according to the National Archives.
2011 to 2013 Maj. Gen. William Neil McCasland serves as commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) at Wright-Patterson. AFRL is the Air Force’s primary scientific research and development center, overseeing classified programs in directed energy, space technology, sensors, and advanced materials.
October 2016 Emails between musician Tom DeLonge and former White House Chief of Staff John Podesta are published by WikiLeaks. In one email, DeLonge tells Podesta that he has been working with McCasland for four months and that the general “not only knows what I’m trying to achieve, he helped assemble the advisory team.” DeLonge states that McCasland was “in charge of the laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base where the Roswell wreckage was shipped.” The emails are part of a broader trove of Podesta’s correspondence released during the 2016 presidential campaign.
June 22, 2025 Aerospace engineer Monica Reza, 60, a co-inventor of the Mondaloy rocket alloy and a former colleague of McCasland, disappears while hiking the Mount Waterman Trail in the Angeles National Forest in California. She has not been found. According to Newsweek, Reza worked on a rocket project overseen by McCasland during her career.
February 27, 2026 McCasland, 68, leaves his Albuquerque residence on foot at approximately 11 a.m. According to the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office, he takes a backpack and a wallet. He leaves behind his phone, prescription glasses, and wearable devices. His wife, Susan McCasland Wilkerson, reports him missing later that day after returning from a medical appointment.
March 4, 2026 The Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office issues a Silver Alert for McCasland, citing unspecified medical concerns. Search teams, including K-9 units, cover approximately 700 homes and search canyons McCasland frequented, including Elena Gallegos and Domingo Baca. Clothing is found near his home, but its connection to McCasland is unclear.
March 6, 2026 The sheriff’s office states it has found no evidence of foul play. The office says it has received no confirmed sightings or surveillance footage showing McCasland leaving the area or indicating a direction of travel.
March 11, 2026 CNN reports that the FBI has joined the search, coordinating with the FBI Albuquerque Field Office. The sheriff’s office cites McCasland’s “background and established partnerships” as the reason for federal involvement.
March 12, 2026 The New York Times publishes a detailed account of the search, noting that McCasland is believed to have left his home on foot at about 11 a.m. on February 27.
March 13, 2026 McCasland’s wife, Susan McCasland Wilkerson, publicly pushes back against UFO-related speculation about her husband’s disappearance. According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, she says she doubts McCasland was kidnapped over classified information or his “brief association with the UFO community.”
March 14, 2026 Republican Representative Eric Burlison of Missouri, who serves on the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, says publicly that McCasland “has a lot of information” and calls his disappearance “really disturbing,” according to Newsweek.
March 15, 2026 Former FBI agent Jonathan Coffindaffer raises questions about the case, telling Newsweek that “conspiracy theorists have been all over” McCasland’s disappearance due to his “military expertise and knowledge of highly classified information, possibly related to nuclear secrets or UFOs.”
March 24, 2026 News Nation reports that the case of Monica Reza, McCasland’s former colleague who disappeared under similar circumstances in June 2025, has gained renewed attention following McCasland’s disappearance.
Who Is Neil McCasland?
William Neil McCasland rose to the rank of major general in the U.S. Air Force. His career placed him at the center of some of the most advanced aerospace research conducted by the American military.
From approximately 2011 to 2013, McCasland served as commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio. AFRL is the Air Force’s principal scientific research and development organization, with a budget of billions of dollars annually and oversight of programs spanning directed energy, space technology, advanced materials, sensors, and autonomous systems.
According to Military.com, McCasland oversaw classified space weapons programs during his career and held top-secret access. He retired from active duty and settled in Albuquerque, where he remained active as an outdoorsman and experienced hiker.
McCasland is 5 feet, 11 inches tall and weighs approximately 160 pounds, according to the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office.
The DeLonge Emails
McCasland’s name entered the public UFO conversation in October 2016, when WikiLeaks published emails from John Podesta’s account. Podesta had served as White House Chief of Staff under President Bill Clinton and as campaign chairman for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential run.
In the emails, musician Tom DeLonge, the former Blink-182 guitarist who had pivoted to UFO advocacy through his company To The Stars Academy, described an ongoing relationship with McCasland. DeLonge told Podesta that he had been “working with him for four months” and that McCasland was already advising him on how to proceed with his UFO-disclosure initiative.
The email published by WikiLeaks contains DeLonge’s account: “When Roswell crashed, they shipped it to the laboratory at Wright Patterson Air Force Base. General McCasland was in charge of that exact laboratory up to a couple years ago. He not only knows what I’m trying to achieve, he helped assemble the advisory team.”
McCasland himself did not publicly confirm or deny DeLonge’s characterization of their relationship. Scheduling emails showed a planned meeting involving DeLonge, Podesta, and someone signing as “Neil McC,” consistent with McCasland.
The emails are claims made by DeLonge, not statements by McCasland. DeLonge’s characterization of McCasland’s role and knowledge has not been independently verified.
Wright-Patterson and the UFO Legacy
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base has been associated with UFO investigations for nearly eight decades. The connection is documented in the public record, though much of the mythology surrounding the base remains unsubstantiated.
The base was the headquarters for all three of the Air Force’s formal UFO investigation programs. Project Sign, established in 1947 after a wave of reported sightings, ran until 1949. It was replaced by Project Grudge, which operated until 1952. Project Blue Book, the longest-running and most well-known of the three, investigated UFO reports from 1952 until its closure on January 30, 1969. According to the National Archives, Project Blue Book examined 12,618 reports. Of those, 701 remained “Unidentified” when the program ended.
The Air Force has stated it has no records of recovered non-human technology. The National Archives, which houses the Project Blue Book records, notes that “unidentified” does not mean extraterrestrial.
The “Hangar 18” legend, which claims that alien bodies and wreckage from the Roswell crash were stored at Wright-Patterson, originated from unverified accounts by former military personnel. In 1974, science-fiction author Robert Spencer Carr publicly claimed on live radio that alien bodies from a 1948 crash in Aztec, New Mexico, were kept at Wright-Patterson. The Air Force denied the claims, and no physical evidence has ever been presented to support them.
McCasland’s command of AFRL, the modern successor to the laboratories that processed some of the earliest UFO reports, places him in the institutional lineage of Wright-Patterson’s UFO history, though his direct involvement in any UFO-related programs during his tenure has not been documented.
The Monica Reza Connection
McCasland’s disappearance has drawn attention to the earlier disappearance of aerospace engineer Monica Jacinto Reza, 60, who went missing on June 22, 2025, while hiking the Mount Waterman Trail in the Angeles National Forest in California.
According to Newsweek, Reza was a co-inventor of Mondaloy, a specialized rocket alloy, and served as Director of the Materials Processing Group at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She had worked on a rocket project overseen by McCasland during her career.
Both individuals disappeared while hiking or leaving home for outdoor activity. Both were experienced in their respective fields and had access to classified or sensitive aerospace information. The similarities have fueled online speculation, though authorities have not established a connection between the two cases.
Reza’s case remains open. She has not been found.
The Investigation: FBI Search for McCasland
The Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office is leading the search, with support from the FBI Albuquerque Field Office. The FBI joined the search for McCasland in mid-March when local authorities requested federal assistance due to his military background and established partnerships. Search resources have included K-9 units, search and rescue personnel, and helicopter units.
Investigators have visited approximately 700 homes in the area surrounding McCasland’s residence and searched canyons he frequented for hiking and trail running. Clothing was found near his home, but the sheriff’s office has not confirmed whether it belonged to McCasland.
As of mid-March, authorities said they had not identified any confirmed sightings or surveillance footage showing McCasland “leaving the area or indicating a direction of travel.” There is no evidence of foul play, but investigators have said they cannot rule out any scenario.
The Silver Alert remains active. The FBI search continues for the missing general as of late March 2026, with no confirmed sightings. Anyone with information is asked to contact the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office.
Opposing Perspectives on the Missing General
The connection between McCasland’s disappearance and UFO-related speculation is based on a single source: Tom DeLonge’s characterization of their relationship in 2016 emails. McCasland never publicly confirmed involvement in UFO research, and his wife has explicitly disputed the connection. Air Force general UFO theories have proliferated online since the case gained national attention, fueled by the historical association between Wright-Patterson and the government’s UFO investigation programs.
Susan McCasland Wilkerson told the Cincinnati Enquirer that she doubted her husband was targeted because of classified information or his “brief association with the UFO community.” She has characterized the online speculation as misinformation.
The Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office has also addressed the conspiracy theories directly. According to Newsweek, the sheriff’s office emphasized that investigators are focused on evidence-based leads rather than speculation.
Former FBI agent Jonathan Coffindaffer, while noting the conspiracy theories, also raised questions about McCasland’s health, suggesting that the Silver Alert was issued for medical reasons that may be more relevant to the case than any classified-information angle.
Several factors point away from a UFO-related explanation. McCasland was an experienced hiker and outdoorsman, according to CNN, and frequently visited the canyons around Albuquerque. Leaving behind his phone and glasses is consistent with a planned outdoor outing, and a Silver Alert was issued for unspecified medical concerns. The unseasonably warm spring in New Mexico, also noted by CNN, has complicated search efforts by degrading potential evidence.
The Monica Reza connection, while noted by some outlets, has not been established by investigators as related to McCasland’s case. Two people who worked in aerospace disappearing while hiking months apart is notable, but correlation does not establish causation, and both New Mexico and southern California have significant populations of outdoor enthusiasts and retired military personnel.
Representative Burlison’s comment that McCasland “has a lot of information” is a statement about what the congressman believes, not a confirmed fact about McCasland’s access to UFO-related material. Burlison serves on a committee that has held hearings on UFO transparency, and his framing reflects the committee’s interest rather than an established connection between McCasland’s career and UAP programs.
Related Video
Ross Coulthart, NewsNation special correspondent, discusses the disappearance of retired Maj. Gen. Neil McCasland and the search efforts. Source: NewsNation via YouTube.
NewsNation Live coverage of the ongoing search for retired Air Force General William Neil McCasland. Source: NewsNation via YouTube.
Ross Coulthart on NewsNation Prime discussing the latest developments in the McCasland case, including the possibility of foul play. Source: NewsNation via YouTube.
YouTube Videos
Sources
Sources
- CNN: FBI search for missing Air Force general McCasland, challenges in New Mexico (March 17, 2026)
- The New York Times: FBI Joins Search for Air Force General Missing (March 12, 2026)
- USA Today: Retired US Air Force major general missing: what we know (March 17, 2026)
- Military.com: Missing Air Force General Case Draws FBI and Online Conspiracy Theories (March 15, 2026)
- Newsweek: Who Is William Neil McCasland? (March 2026)
- Newsweek: Missing US General “has a lot of information” on UFOs, Congressman Burlison (March 14, 2026)
- Newsweek: Former FBI Agent Raises Question on Missing General’s Health (March 2026)
- Newsweek: Sheriff Addresses UFO Conspiracy Theories (March 2026)
- Newsweek: Monica Reza Case Gains Attention After Disappearance of US General (March 24, 2026)
- Cincinnati Enquirer: New details emerge in missing Air Force general (March 17, 2026)
- Cincinnati Enquirer: Wife of missing general disputes UFO ties (March 13, 2026)
- ABC News: Retired Air Force major general missing: what we know (March 2026)
- National Archives: Project Blue Book: UFO Records
- WikiLeaks: Podesta Emails: General McCasland (Email ID 3099)