Could be. You'd probably get a USAF guy or an RAF guy knocking around that town....
...but Short Brackland is still a "random area".
In Germany, there were always "honey trap" warnings. And that was in a Garrison. In Northern Ireland, there were the obvious warnings...and no one strayed (although the MP's in plain clothes did rescue one guy from a girls house, before anything happened or could have happened...and they went in with guns drawn and boots flying).
This.... is just something very weird, IF it is that. And that's why I hesitate to think it is "that".
EDIT.... maybe its a generational thing. But thinking back, no one ever left anyone on their own. You'd get hammered...but even then, you'd still ask "how they are getting home". The thing is, you would still "check", even in a "half cut" way. If someone said, I'm walking, that wouldn't be "okay". Food and a taxi, yeah I see that. But that brings me back to "it;s such a random place for an abduction".