By Chris Boyette, CNN

(CNN) — An experienced hiker and avid outdoorsman, William Neil McCasland isn’t the typical missing person, but the retired Air Force major general hasn’t been seen since he walked out of his Albuquerque home on the morning of February 27, leaving behind his phone, prescription glasses and wearable devices.

As part of the search, authorities flew a helicopter equipped with infrared cameras over the cliffs and canyons near his home at night, hoping to spot him by his heat signature. But the unseasonably warm spring turned the landscape against them.

“The mountain was just lit up like a candle,” Lt. Kyle Woods of the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office said at a news conference Monday. “We couldn’t differentiate from heat signatures and the heat from the rocks.”

Seventeen days after his disappearance, officials still can’t say where the 68-year-old went, why he left or whether someone else was involved — a mystery deepened by public fascination with the retired general’s ties to UFO lore.

Surveillance cameras cover both ends of McCasland’s street, yet authorities said Monday they are still combing through that footage along with video provided by residents.

Asked if authorities believe something nefarious may have happened, Woods said, “We haven’t ruled anything out, but we have nothing pointing to it either.”

What McCasland did and didn’t take with him has become central to the investigation. Woods said it was uncommon for McCasland to leave without his phone or wearable devices, both of which were found at his home.

McCasland has a second home in Pagosa Springs, Colorado, about 35 miles north of the New Mexico border and roughly 200 miles from his Albuquerque home. There, investigators recovered a light green long-sleeve button-up shirt and hiking boots, according to the sheriff’s office. Still unaccounted for are McCasland’s wallet, a .38-caliber revolver, a leather holster and a red backpack. Authorities have not said whether they believe he had those items when he left.

A gray US Air Force sweatshirt was found about 1.25 miles east of McCasland’s home on March 7 — eight days after he disappeared, Bernalillo County Sheriff John Allen said. McCasland’s family hasn’t confirmed it was his, but no blood was detected on the shirt in initial testing and the discovery led investigators to target the area for additional searches.

‘The most intelligent person in the room’

During his career, McCasland was at the center of some of the Pentagon’s most advanced aerospace research and once commanded the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. But he had reported experiencing “mental fog” before his disappearance, a condition he cited as the reason for stepping down from various groups he worked with, officials said Monday.

Allen declined to go into further detail out of respect for McCasland’s family.

Still, Woods pushed back against any suggestion that McCasland was impaired.

“There’s no indication, and we are not putting forward that Mr. McCasland was disoriented or 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.”

Woods said that after authorities were made aware of the mental fog and considering McCasland’s age, they is

The post District Attorney John T. Savrnoch Calls on Legislature to Fix Mental Health Diversion Law Through Assembly Bill 46 appeared first on edhat.

By Anna Cooban, CNN

London (CNN) — Attacks on commercial ships in the Middle East this month have all but closed the vital Strait of Hormuz to tankers, upending the oil market and sending producers in search of other routes to get their fuel to buyers around the world.

One of the few alternatives goes through the Red Sea. Saudi Aramco, the world’s top oil producer, said last week that it would reroute millions of barrels of crude – ordinarily loaded onto ships in the Persian Gulf and transiting the strait – via a pipeline running to Saudi Arabia’s western port of Yanbu in the Red Sea.

The number of daily oil loadings at the port has already more than doubled this month compared with the daily average last year, according to data from Kpler, a trade data and analytics company.

But now even that lifeline is at risk.

On Monday, Iran called US naval facilities in the Red Sea “potential targets.”

“The presence of the US aircraft carrier Gerald R. Ford in the Red Sea is considered a threat to Iran,” said Iran’s unified military command, according to the country’s semi-official Fars news agency. “Therefore, logistical and service centers supporting the mentioned naval group in the Red Sea will be regarded as potential targets by Iran’s armed forces.”

Even before the current war broke out on February 28, the Red Sea was “not exactly a bastion of geopolitical stability,” as David Oxley, chief climate and commodities economist at consultancy Capital Economics, put it.

In late 2023, Iran-backed Houthi militants began attacking vessels in the Red Sea in retaliation for Israel’s war against Hamas. The security situation forced shipping companies to redirect their vessels around the southern tip of Africa, adding weeks onto journeys and forcing them to spend more on fuel, insurance and seafarers’ wages.

The current regional conflict and “the continued hostile posture of Houthi forces toward commercial shipping” mean that the threat level in the Red Sea is “substantial,” the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Centre said in an advisory Monday.

“The group retains both the capability and demonstrated intent to conduct maritime attacks in the region,” it warned.

One Israeli source also told CNN last week that there were indications the militants might carry out attacks against Israel, which would mark a first since the war began.

‘There’s no out’

At full capacity, the Saudi east-to-west pipeline can transport 7 million barrels of crude oil per day, according to Saudi Aramco, compensating to some extent for the roughly 15 million barrels per day that would normally go through the Strait of Hormuz.

But a resurgence of violence in the Red Sea could block those diverted oil flows as well, exacerbating existing fears over global supply and pushing oil prices even higher, analysts told CNN.

If tankers carrying Saudi oil come under attack in the Red Sea, “I think we (will) then see a material price spike in oil,” said Naveen Das, a senior oil analyst at Kpler. “Because it basically signals to the market that… all of the sort of escape routes (for oil) are being targeted… There’s no out.”

Oxley at Capital Economics said that, if violence returns to the Red Sea and “completely traps” the supply of crude from the oil-rich region, he could envisage the price of Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, soaring to between $130 and $150 a barrel from its current level of around $10

Por Brad Lendon y Isaac Yee, CNN en Español

Un buque de guerra de la Armada de EE.UU., que se cree transportaba a miles de Marines y marineros hacia Medio Oriente, se aproximaba al estrecho de Malaca, frente a Singapur, mientras se dirigía a la región, según datos de seguimiento marítimo publicados este martes.

El buque de asalto anfibio USS Tripoli se acercaba a Singapur, en el extremo suroccidental del mar de China Meridional, la mañana de este martes, según datos de seguimiento AIS vistos por CNN.

Los buques de la Armada de EE.UU. suelen desplazarse con los transpondedores AIS apagados. Revelar su posición al transitar por zonas con intenso tráfico marítimo, como las aguas alrededor de Singapur, permite operaciones más seguras.

Se cree que el Tripoli transporta militares de la 31ª Unidad Expedicionaria de los Marines (MEU, por sus siglas en inglés), con base en Okinawa, una fuerza de respuesta rápida de 2.200 efectivos, después de que el Pentágono ordenara el despliegue de la unidad, según tres funcionarios familiarizados con los planes.

CNN solicitó comentarios a la Séptima Flota y a la Quinta Flota de la Armada de EE.UU.

Funcionarios dijeron a CNN que la unidad estaba siendo enviada a Medio Oriente, sin revelar exactamente dónde sería desplegada ni para qué se utilizaría.

Una MEU está compuesta por cuatro elementos: mando, combate terrestre, combate aéreo y combate logístico. Estas unidades suelen emplearse en misiones como evacuaciones y operaciones anfibias que requieren movimientos de barco a tierra, como incursiones y asaltos. También cuentan con componentes de combate terrestre y aéreo, y algunas unidades están entrenadas para operaciones especiales.

Marinetraffic.com mostró la ruta de un “buque de guerra estadounidense no especificado” que partió de Okinawa el 11 de marzo, atravesó el mar de China Meridional y se acercaba a Singapur la mañana de este martes a una velocidad de unos 35 km/h.

Con base en Sasebo, Japón, el Tripoli, de casi 259 metros de eslora y un desplazamiento de 45.000 toneladas, es esencialmente un portaaviones pequeño y transporta cazas furtivos F-35 y aeronaves de transporte MV-22 Osprey, así como embarcaciones de desembarco para trasladar militares a tierra.

Es el buque principal de un grupo anfibio listo para el combate, que normalmente incluiría los buques de transporte anfibio USS New Orleans y USS San Diego. CNN no pudo confirmar la presencia de esas embarcaciones más pequeñas junto al Tripoli en los sitios de seguimiento marítimo.

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The post Buque de guerra estadounidense, que se cree transporta Marines hacia Medio Oriente, es rastreado frente a Singapur appeared first on News Channel 3-12.

CNN

By Zachary Cohen, CNN

(CNN) — A senior US intelligence official appointed by President Donald Trump abruptly announced he is stepping down from his post on Tuesday, citing misgivings about the administration’s war with Iran.

“After much reflection, I have decided to resign from my position as Director of the National Counterterrorism Center, effective today,” Joe Kent wrote in a post on X.

“I cannot in good conscience support the ongoing war in Iran. Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation, and it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby,” Kent added in the resignation letter he attached to the post.

Kent was a staunch supporter of Trump and the MAGA movement, and his resignation marks the first high-profile departure of the president’s second term over a major policy issue. Some lawmakers and experts have raised doubts over the intelligence the president used to justify the war, and the departure of a key intelligence official will increase scrutiny of the administration’s case.

A senior US official confirmed that Kent was resigning.

Trump said Tuesday that it’s a “good thing” Kent resigned over his objections to the war with Iran, deriding him as “very weak on security.”

“When somebody is working with us that says they didn’t think Iran was a threat, we don’t want those people,” Trump said from the Oval Office. “They’re not smart people, or they’re not savvy people.”

The Office of Director of National Intelligence did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

After the initial wave of strikes against Iran, Trump cited an “imminent threat” to the US, and administration officials said the US acted in response to potential preemptive attacks by Iran on forces in the region — claims that were contradicted in Pentagon briefings to Capitol Hill, where defense officials said Iran was not planning to attack unless struck first.

Kent blamed Israeli officials and the media for misleading Trump about the threat posed by Iran.

“This echo chamber was used to deceive you into believing that Iran posed an imminent threat to the United States, and that should you strike now, there was a clear path to victory,” he wrote in his resignation letter. “This was a lie and is the same tactic the Israelis used to draw us into the disastrous Iraq war that cost our nation the lives of thousands of our best men and women. We cannot make this mistake again.”

The Iran war and the close US alliance with Israel have divided the MAGA movement. Some prominent figures in the movement, including Megyn Kelly and Tucker Carlson, have been critical of the Trump administration on both counts. The critical camp also includes influential podcasting voices such as Joe Rogan, Theo Von and Tim Dillon, who were credited with helping fuel Trump’s 2024 victory but have since soured on the president over foreign policy and oth