text: Skip in Skip x Embed x Share CLOSE New details emerged Thursday in the intense search for two Afghan student airmen missing from Moody Air Force Base. WXIA 
   
   Authorities say Mirwais Kohistani and Shirzad Rohullah failed to show up for their training at the base on Monday. (Photo: NBC) 
   
   MOODY AIR FORCE BASE, Ga. — New details emerged Thursday in the intense search for two Afghan student airmen missing from Moody Air Force Base, about 230 miles south of Atlanta, near Valdosta. 
   
   Authorities say Mirwais Kohistani and Shirzad Rohullah failed to show up at the base for training Monday. 
   
   “They’ve just gone missing. We’re not sure why,” said U.S. Air Force spokesman Ed Gulick. 
   
   Gulick said by phone law enforcement officials are tracing the steps the two men took the last five days. 
   
   Valdosta Regional Airport officials confirmed law enforcement seized hours of surveillance video in connection with the disappearance of the Afghan men. The base would not confirm reports the men rented a car there. 
   
   “As you know, they’re from Afghanistan over there fighting for their country’s freedom. So, there are those that would want to harm them if they found out they were in the Afghanistan air force,” said Gulick. 
   
   Gulick said the disappearance could even put the men's families at risk of being attacked. Gulick said he does not believe the men pose a threat to anyone in the United States. He said the pair were nominated by the Afghan air force, vetted first by the U.S. Naval Air Training Command, then by the Department of State before they were issued visas. 
   
   Moody AFB (Photo: WXIA) 
   
   “It’s not the first time it’s happened, so we just want to find them if we can,” said Gulick. “I think we just think we continue to look for them, and follow to try and find them." 
   
   In September 2014, three senior Afghan military officers who failed to return to a Camp Edwards, a National Guard training facility at Joint Base Cape Cod, Mass., were taken into custody while trying to cross into Canada and subsequently sent back to Afghanistan. 
   
   The three soldiers from the Afghan National Army had arrived in the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2014, to take part in a two-week training exercise. 
   
   The officers, who were identified as Maj. Jan Mohammad Arash, Capt. Mohammad Nasir Askarzada and Capt. Noorullah Aminy, were among 200 soldiers from Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan, Kazakhstan and Mongolia taking part in the tactical exercises at Camp Edwards. All three carried Afghan passports and valid U.S. visas, according to military officials. 
   
   Contributing: Doug Stanglin, USA TODAY. Follow Dontaye Carter on Twitter: @DontayeCarter 
   
   Read or Share this story: http://usat.ly/1QzmPVZ ||||| ATLANTA (AP) — Two Afghan men who were training with the U.S. military are missing from a base in south Georgia, but officials say that they were screened before entering the country and that there's no indication they pose a threat. 
   
   FILE -In this Friday, Oct. 29, 1999 file photo, a mock F-16 fighter jet is silhouetted against the sky at sunrise as workers pass through security and make their way onto Moody Air Force Base, near Valdosta,... (Associated Press) 
   
   "There's zero evidence that these guys are terrorists," said Brian Childress, police chief in Valdosta, which is near Moody Air Force Base. 
   
   The men didn't report Monday to maintenance training with the 81st Fighter Squadron, base officials said in a statement Tuesday night. 
   
   Federal, local and state agencies are working with the military to find the men, Childress said Wednesday. Moody officials informed him Tuesday morning the men were missing, he said. The men's names have not been released. 
   
   Both men were being trained in aircraft maintenance and were scheduled to graduate from the program Dec. 18, said Lt. Col. Chris Karns, an Air Force spokesman. After graduation, they were to return to Afghanistan to begin working with A-29 Super Tucano airplanes in their home country, Karns said. 
   
   The last contact the base had with the men was on Friday, Karns said. Trainees are allowed to go off base on the weekends, and they failed to report back to the program Monday, he said. 
   
   The military has no reason to believe they present a threat to anyone, said Karns. They were screened by both the U.S. and the government of Afghanistan before their arrival in the United States more than a year ago, he said. Karns added that he has no reason to believe they're armed and there are no reports of missing weapons. 
   
   The two had been at Moody since February 2015 as part of the training program aimed at improving the Afghanistan air force, according to the base's statement. 
   
   The program's goal is to train a total of 30 Afghan pilots and 90 Afghan maintenance personnel during a four-year period, Moody Air Force Base said in an August 2014 release when the program was announced. It was not clear how many trainees from Afghanistan are currently at the base. 
   
   Conducting such training at a U.S. base instead of Afghanistan is safer, Karns said. 
   
   Base officials met with local law enforcement several months ago to plan for the possibility that some of the Afghanistan trainees could go absent without leave, Childress said. 
   
   "Anytime you bring in foreign military to our country, you have to prepare for that kind of thing," Childress said. 
   
   He said that on Tuesday, he began hearing from Valdosta residents concerned about the missing men "in light of what's happened out in San Bernardino," but he called this "a totally different circumstance." 
   
   "You've got to remember these folks were cleared by the U.S. military and by the Department of Defense to come in and train," Childress said. "These guys have been here since February of 2015, and they have not caused a problem at all." 
   
   _____ 
   
   Baldor reported from Washington, D.C.
target: – Two Afghan airmen who didn't show up for training at a US Air Force base in Georgia on Monday are missing, and authorities suspect it's because they don't want to go home. An Air Force spokesman tells USA Today that law enforcement officials are searching for Mirwais Kohistani and Shirzad Rohullah, who were being trained in aircraft maintenance. The spokesman tells 11Alive that the men were nominated by the Afghan Air Force and heavily vetted by US authorities before being accepted for training at Moody Air Force Base, so they probably don't pose a threat to anybody in the US. "It's not the first time it's happened, so we just want to find them if we can," he says. Another Air Force spokesman tells the AP that the trainees, who were allowed off the base over the weekend and haven't been heard from since, were due to graduate from the training program next week and return to Afghanistan. The police chief in the nearby town of Valdosta tells the AP that there is "zero indication" that the men are terrorists. "You've got to remember these folks were cleared by the US military and by the Department of Defense to come in and train," he says. "These guys have been here since February of 2015, and they have not caused a problem at all." Three Afghan soldiers who vanished during a training exercise in Massachusetts last year were sent back to their homeland after being caught at the Canadian border.