The Missing Airman

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In most missing persons' cases, time eventually provides answers.

The individual is either found safe and well, or sadly, they are located after passing.

However, in a frustratingly small number of cases, neither the family nor the public ever receives true closure.

When this lack of resolution is due to police failings, the consequences can be devastating.

This was certainly the case in the investigation we'll be exploring in this episode: that of the missing airman.

Each day in the UK, between 800 and 900 people are reported missing to the police.

Most of these cases are categorized as absent of their own accord, which includes children leaving care settings, patients leaving hospitals against advice, or people avoiding family or fleeing from violence or financial pressures.

Fortunately, many of these individuals are found quickly and are unharmed, often due to modern technology.

In the past, disappearances were much more difficult to solve, but with digital advancements, 79% of missing children and 76% of missing adults in the UK are located within 24 hours.

These numbers rise to 90% and 86% respectively within 48 hours.

Despite these improvements, some disappearances remain unsolved, becoming enduring mysteries.

A prominent UK case is that of 35-year-old Claudia Lawrence, who vanished in 2009.

Although she was seen on CCTV the previous day, she failed to show up for her shift at work.

Her home was found to be undisturbed and there was no indication she had planned to disappear.

Despite extensive investigations, her whereabouts remain unknown.

When missing persons investigations fail, Authorities often face public criticism, as seen in the case of Nicola Bulley who vanished in January 2023 whilst walking her dog near her home.

Her phone and dog were found near the River Wire, sparking theories of foul play.

However, her body was recovered weeks later, a mile from where her belongings were found, with her death attributed to an accidental drowning.

Despite this, speculation and police failures left lingering questions about her untimely demise.

Another case shrouded in lingering uncertainty is the disappearance disappearance of RAF airman Cory McKeague in 2016.

Last seen after a night out in Suffolk, his whereabouts remain a mystery, with police errors and delays compounding the confusion.

It remains one of the UK's most baffling missing persons cases, leaving behind a trail of unanswered questions that seem to lead nowhere.

On the evening of Friday 23rd September 2016, Cory McKeague went out with friends in the town centre of Bury St Edmunds.

Born and raised in the county of Fife, Scotland, Corrie chose to enlist in the Royal Air Force after completing his schooling.

He joined the prestigious Royal Air Force Regiment, a highly specialised unit known for its elite aptitudes in ground defences and security.

After successfully completing his training, McKeag was posted to RAF Huntington where he quickly distinguished himself, qualifying as both a gunner and a medic and attaining the rank of senior aircraftsman.

At the time of his disappearance, McKeague's life appeared to be progressing well.

Five months earlier, he had entered into a relationship with April Oliver, and the couple appeared to be happy.

With April away on holiday in the United States, it's possible that McKeague's decision to go out that night was influenced by her absence.

Known for his sociable and fun-loving nature, he was fond of drinking, particularly during weekends or downtime from his military duties.

Those who knew him described him as someone who enjoyed a good time.

On the night of the 23rd, McKee drove approximately 10 miles from REF Huntington to Bury St Edmunds, a town renowned for its vibrant nightlife.

After parking his vehicle, he made his way into the town centre to meet his friends.

The group spent several hours drinking and socialising in various bars without incident.

However, in the early hours of the 24th of September, the night took a sudden turn.

McKeague was asked to leave the Flex Nightclub on St Andrews Street South, where Dorstaff had deemed him too intoxicated to remain.

The bouncers on duty that evening recalled that Corrie accepted their decision to ask him to leave without complaint, and he caused no further issues.

He even stood at the front doors of the nightclub making small talk with them for some time before heading off to get some some food.

Corrie then walked a short distance to a takeaway called Mamma Mia, a place he frequently visited after nights out.

He remained there from 1.15 to 1.30am enjoying his meal before setting off back towards the town centre.

Separated from his friends, this would be the last time anyone ever saw him, alive or otherwise.

One of the first factors that complicated the Cory McKee disappearance was the fact that he'd been given the weekend off from the base.

It wasn't until the morning of Monday the 26th of September when he failed to report for duty that anyone noticed he was missing.

When it was ascertained that he was not answering his mobile phone and that his car had not been returned to the base, a missing persons report was filed with the authorities.

This resulted in a significant search of the ground between Bury St Edmunds and RAF Honington, involving not only the police, but also staff from the airbase itself.

At that time, tensions were unusually high, as several weeks prior, unknown offenders had reportedly tried to kidnap a serviceman at Knife Point.

Though the unsuccessful abduction attempt had occurred at another airbase, RAF Marham in Norfolk, it had nonetheless gained significant media attention.

Many officials speculated that the attempted kidnapping had been the work of a terrorist group and that they would soon try again.

Early on in the investigation, authorities in Bury St Edmonds located Corrie's car, which was still where he'd parked it in the city centre.

Knowing that this most likely meant there would be surveillance footage, the local police urgently carried out CCTV inquiries.

Luckily, they were able to ascertain Corrie's movements after he left the takeaway.

According to the videos, in the early hours of Saturday morning, Corrie settled down in a random doorway, where he fell asleep for approximately two hours.

After waking up, he walked off along Brent Goville Street, a short stretch of road between St Andrews and Wells.

Finally, at approximately 3.25am, he disappeared into a dead-end area known locally as the Horseshoe due to its curved configuration.

Despite their best efforts, The investigating officers were unable to find any footage of Corrie being seen to have re-emerged from this area.

For investigators, the details were incredibly frustrating.

To be able to track down Corrie's movements so meticulously, only to have him disappear in the middle of the town, seemed almost surreal.

Where could he have gone?

More importantly, if he didn't leave on foot, how could he have gotten there?

But it wouldn't take long for new evidence to come to light proving that whatever happened to Corrie McKeag, it didn't end in the horseshoe that that night.

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Like most people, Corrie possessed a mobile phone, and when investigators got hold of his carrier's location data, they were shocked to see that he had ultimately left the town centre before travelling in a northwesterly direction along the A1101 road.

Though it initially seemed like he might have been heading back to base, RAF Huntington is actually to the northeast of Bury St Edmonds.

By following the signal, they were able to see that it continued to transmit intermittently over a distance of approximately 12 miles.

Unfortunately, the data stream finally concluded at 8am in the vicinity of the village of Barton Mills.

There was zero indication of why the phone signal had been terminated, unless it was manually switched off, damaged or out of battery.

Curiously, a search of the vicinity did locate the back of a plastic mobile phone case, but it could not be conclusively identified as belonging to Corrie.

With no new leads, the investigation began to slow down.

Several days later, officials were rocked by some disturbing news.

Authorities in the village of Tintwhistle had come across a suitcase containing the burned and dismembered body of an adult male.

At first, it seemed like a compelling, if heartbreaking, lead.

However, a subsequent investigation by Derbyshire Constabulary would later prove that the two events were not related to each other in any way.

DNA analysis of those remains would eventually result in a murder charge for a man who had killed his business partner and clumsily attempted to hide the evidence.

One of the people who contributed the most to the investigation was Nicola Urquhart.

Not only was she an experienced police officer, but she was also Corrie's mother.

When asked what she thought happened to her son, she stated that she was fearful that an unknown third party might be responsible.

During previous nights out and when he had become overly intoxicated, Corrie had walked home to the airbase or slept rough somewhere until he was sober enough to do so.

She believed that Corrie was too trusting, even at the best of times, and that he might have accepted a lift back to the airbase from someone bearing malicious intent.

Was it possible he was not found on any CCTV footage after 3.25am

because he he had gotten into a vehicle.

Indeed, the speed at which Corrie's phone had moved suggested that he was most likely in transit rather than on foot.

Could he have been under the impression that he was travelling northeast when he was actually moving northwest?

Unfortunately, Nicola's fears would only go on to be compounded by the very people she had trusted to find her son.

Whilst the police remained adamant that they had done all they could, the investigation was about to take an even more frustrating turn.

With efforts to locate Corrie focused along the narrow corridor his mobile phone had travelled the morning he disappeared, attention had shifted away from the place he was last seen.

Many agree that this was a mistake, as the police search of the horseshoe had mostly just focused on physical evidence.

But in the days after his disappearance, a local pointed out that there was a significant number of large disposal bins located within the horseshoe.

Was it not possible that he or his remains could have ended up inside one of these bins?

This theory gained significant traction when it was ascertained that there was a waste disposal site located near where the mobile phone signal had finally terminated.

Suddenly, A horrible new possibility was coming to light.

On the one hand, it's possible that Corrie had been harmed in the alleyway and that the perpetrator had placed his body in one of the bins.

However, given his tendency to sleep rough when intoxicated, officers pointed out that it was just as likely that he climbed into one of them to go to sleep.

In either case, a bin lorry could have picked him or his remains up and transported them to the facility at Barton Mills.

Police inquiries confirmed that a bin lorry had indeed entered the horseshoe at some time during the morning in question, and they duly located and seized the vehicle for analysis.

Though the outcome would have been far from the closure anyone wanted, at least the authorities and the family would have an explanation.

But once again, the lead went nowhere.

Within days of the revelation, The investigation team released a media statement that effectively ruled out this scenario.

They'd performed a careful analysis of the vehicle's internal waste management system and determined that the bin lorry had only been carrying a load of roughly 15kg when it made its way back from the horseshoe to the waste disposal site.

As Corrie himself weighed in the region of 90kg,

it would not have been possible for him to have been picked up and moved by the bin lorry.

Finding themselves at a dead end once again, the investigation resumed, but at a snail's pace.

It wasn't until March of 2017, nearly seven months after Corrie's disappearance, that there was finally an arrest.

It wasn't for murder or for abduction, but for perverting the course of justice.

This charge is typically used by the police when someone has committed an intentional act with the aim of influencing the outcome of a police investigation.

And to the horror of Corrie's family, the detectives now stated that they had somehow been provided with incorrect or misleading data in relation to the weight of the bin lorry and its cargo.

Despite their initial assumption that the load had been too light to be carrying a human body, the actual weight was in fact 10 times what they had initially believed.

After months of doing nothing, it was now almost certain that the bin lorry had contained McKeague's remains, living or dead.

But, due to the incorrect calculations, a critical window for finding the remains had closed.

On the 7th of March, the suspect was released.

Ultimately, police stated that they believed he had genuinely made a mistake, resulting in the charges being dropped.

Still, the new information would prompt drastic action by the police, who sought to take control of the landfill site and began to syphri the debris there.

For the remainder of the year, specialist officers would search through over 6,500 tonnes of waste and recycling, searching for any trace of the missing airmen.

Midway through this effort, a brief period of hope arose from the discovery of a human skull.

But once again, this item was discounted from the investigation when it was revealed to be a private artefact from the 1940s that had been legally disposed of at the site by a customer.

Finally, after several months and over £2 million in funding, Suffolk Police ended their efforts to locate Cory McKeague.

Based on the new, correct calculations of the lorry's weight, they and the subsequent coronial inquest concluded that the REF gunner had likely fallen asleep inside one of the bins inside the horseshoe area.

This meant he almost certainly would have been crushed to death when the contents of the bin he was inside were compressed inside the rear of the bin lorry.

Afterwards, his remains had been transported away from the town centre before being deposited somewhere inside the landfill site.

And with that horrifying determination, the authorities effectively ended any further efforts to locate Cory McKeeg.

But it has done little to satisfy the many unanswered questions which relate to his disappearance.

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The immediate reaction of Corrie's family to the termination of the police investigation was one of public anger and bitter disappointment.

For her part, Corrie's mother believed that there had been serious failings in the efforts of Suffolk Constabulary to locate her son.

While she understood that there were elements of the investigation that the police could not share, She was critical of the manner in which the data had been analysed from the seized bin lorry.

It was clear that something had gone very wrong somewhere, as two such drastically different weights had been identified and then accepted by the investigating officers.

However, her criticism, like the case itself, took a surprising turn.

Rather than accept that her son was crushed to death, She argued that the 100kg load was not as exceptional or conclusive as investigators claimed.

She pointed out that similar heavy weights had been recovered from the horseshoe site by the waste disposal company on a number of prior occasions.

It was therefore not accurate to state that Corrie must have been the cause of the increased weight when other factors have previously been present.

Nicola also pointed out that opportunities to preserve CCTV evidence for future analysis had not been fully explored by the officers sent out to view the footage at the time.

Even factoring in cameras owned by local businesses as well as the town's public CCTV systems, it was impossible to have full coverage of the route Corrie had taken.

It was also clear that only footage up to noon on the day of the disappearance had been seized or preserved, with everything else having been deleted from the system.

This means that it was impossible to prove that Corrie had not emerged from the horseshoe after that time and then walked of his own accord out of the town centre.

Nicola maintained that with Corrie having slept in the doorway for two hours and then woken up, it would be unlikely that he would settle down to sleep again such a short time later.

Corrie was very proud of his appearance and had never been known to sleep in a bin before, so she doubted that he would have done such a thing on this occasion.

There was also the question of how, if he had been crushed to death in the bin lorry, his phone would have continued to work for several hours afterwards.

Moreover, why would the supposed part of his phone be found on the ground near where the signal ended if it had been secured inside the bin lorry at that time?

Sadly, as would later happen with the case of Nicola Bully, Corrie's family would also have to contend with the idle speculation of the general public over what had taken place.

Such conjecture hit a fever pitch when it was discovered that Corrie's girlfriend April was pregnant with their child.

Immediately people began to theorise that he either disappeared or killed himself himself out of fear of becoming a new father.

The only problem was that April had only texted Corrie and informed him she was pregnant after he had disappeared and he had never received the message.

Nonetheless, this rumour soon gave way to the idea that Corrie was participating in multiple relationships and had a number of profiles on swinger sites.

none of which were found to have any substance or relevance to the actual case.

For many, it was simply impossible to let go of the idea that Corrie had been abducted, especially with his disappearance coming so soon after the attempted abduction at RAF Marham.

Honington, where Corrie was stationed, would have made a logical secondary target for terrorists, as would the young airman himself.

By all accounts, Corrie McKeague was proud of his service.

He posted about it on social media, wore his uniform in public and drove a distinctive car.

On that Friday night in Bury St Edmunds, he was intoxicated and off guard.

Someone could easily have followed him or waited for him.

If they abducted him, any number of things could have happened.

But if they assaulted him and placed him in the bin, the rest of the story could have played out just as the police believe.

It is important to note that the attack Atari F.

Marham had been an abduction attempt at knife point.

Outright murder would be a significant but not impossible escalation.

Though the suggestion of Corrie being a frightened future dad on the run was groundless, many people feel there is sufficient evidence to say that he could have either run away or committed suicide.

But, from what police were able to determine, there is absolutely no evidence of Corrie having made any preparations to end his life.

He was in a stable relationship and there were no issues with his employment.

Plus he had not left any form of message or notification that he was contemplating suicide.

Indeed, the situation appeared to be precisely the opposite.

He had upcoming plans to meet with his brother and also to fly home to Scotland to be with family.

In addition to this, he had also left his dog unattended back at the airbase, which would not be something he would have done if he had intended to return.

And if he had committed suicide, where is the body?

It seems unlikely that he would have killed himself whilst in the bin, though that would be the only explanation that fits all of the available data.

Of course, as with all missing persons, some contend that Corrie is still out there somewhere, living a new life.

They argue that he'd perhaps met a new girl on a dating website and fallen in love, and that his night out had been some sort of last hurrah.

Again, this theory is based completely on conjecture and does not fit the facts.

Given how close he was with his family, it seems unlikely that he would just abandon them without so much as a word or a letter.

Whilst few people can agree on what happened to Corrie McKeig, most believe the police investigation into the matter was on some level flawed, especially concerning the misunderstandings and assumptions made in relation to the waste data that was recovered.

Experts claim that it would be impossible to locate evidence of Corrie's remains within the landfill site, even if searches were conducted at a future point.

If he had to have been crushed as hypothesised, then his body would have deteriorated at a far faster rate than usual, and with numerous other DNA sources having been deposited at the site since then, it would now be impossible to definitively separate any trace of him from what has since accumulated.

The failure to secure a more extended timeframe of CCTV footage by the police is also frustrating, as it leaves open the possibility that a third party could have been involved.

Because of this oversight, we will never know for sure whether Corrie left the town centre via a gap in coverage or if there was an error in how the footage was downloaded or interpreted by the officers.

Much as with the other cases mentioned within this episode, it is these doubts that cause so much pain and frustration for Corrie's friends and family, and which cause such a lack of trust by the broader population in those who have been tasked with solving the problem.

The case of Corrie McKeague is a perfect example of how it's still possible for a person to completely disappear off the face of the earth, despite all the odds to the contrary.

The United Kingdom is notorious for having one of the heaviest concentrations of CCTV cameras in the modern world, and is often classified as a surveillance society.

And yet, even with all this footage, the presence of mobile phone data and supporting data from a waste disposal company, the mystery remains.

Still, various elements of society choose to believe what they want and to slant or characterize the available evidence to suit their needs.

Is this a new cultural development, like many other unfortunate trends that have emerged from the modern growth of social media?

Or is it the fact that the small gaps within the available evidence are so deep that only the uncertainty can prevail?

Will every unsolved missing person's investigation in the future be clouded by lingering doubt?

We can only hope that this won't be the case, and that as a society, we learn to be more tolerant and understanding of high-profile disappearances.

This is especially important for the loved ones of Corrie McKeig and for all those affected by the disappearance of a friend or family member.

Years later, the disappearance of Corrie McKeague remains one of the most complex and emotionally charged missing persons cases in recent British history.

Despite a timeline supported by CCTV footage, mobile data and multiple witness statements, the truth of what occurred during those early morning hours has never been fully proven.

Whether Corrie fell victim to a tragic accident, a targeted crime, or a critical investigative failure, what lingers most is the profound absence left in his wake.

Even in an age of near-total digital surveillance, the world still finds ways to lose people.

For his family and those who knew him, closure has proved elusive, as has trust in the very systems designed to provide it.

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