A US Tomahawk hit a naval base next to an Iranian school, according to a video

The video, uploaded on Sunday by Iran’s semi-official Mehr news agency and verified by The New York Times, shows a Tomahawk cruise missile hitting a naval base next to the school in the city of Minab on February 28. The US military is the only force involved in the conflict that uses Tomahawk missiles.

A body of evidence collected by The Times, including satellite images, social media posts and other verified videos, indicates that the Shajarah Tayyebeh Primary School building was severely damaged by a precision strike that occurred simultaneously with the attacks on the naval base. The base is operated by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

When asked by a Times reporter on Saturday whether the United States had bombed the school, President Trump responded: “No. In my opinion, and based on what I have seen, that was done by Iran. He added: “As you know, they are very inaccurate with their ammunition.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who was standing next to Trump, said the Pentagon was investigating, “but the only side attacking civilians is Iran.”

Video of the attack, initially reported by investigative collective Bellingcat, was independently verified by The Times. We compare the features visible in the footage with new satellite images captured days after the Minab attacks.

The video was filmed from a construction site in front of the base and shows a worn dirt path through a grassy area and piles of rubble, also evident in recent satellite images, bolstering its credibility. The video also matches other verified videos taken immediately after the attacks.

A Times analysis of the video shows the missile hitting a building described as a medical clinic at the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps base. Columns of smoke and debris shoot from the building after the impact, while distant screams from onlookers can be heard.

As the camera pans to the right, large plumes of dust and smoke rise from around the elementary school, suggesting that it was attacked shortly before the attack on the naval base. This is supported by a timeline of the attacks compiled by The Times, which shows that the school was attacked at around the same time as the base.

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Several other buildings within the naval base were also hit by precision strikes, an analysis of satellite images showed. The lack of visible weapon fragments and the impossibility of outside journalists reaching the scene have made it difficult to determine precisely what happened.

The Times has identified the weapon seen in the new video as a Tomahawk cruise missile, a weapon that neither the Israeli nor the Iranian military possesses. Dozens of Tomahawks have been launched from US Navy warships towards Iran since February 28, when the US-Israeli attack on Iran began.

US Central Command said a released video showing several Tomahawks being launched from Navy ships was filmed on February 28, the day the Iranian base and school were attacked.

The Department of Defense describes Tomahawks as long-range, high-precision guided missiles that can fly approximately 1,000 miles. They are programmed with a specific flight plan before launch and automatically navigate to their targets.

Each Tomahawk is approximately 6 meters long and has a wingspan of 2.5 meters, according to the Navy. The most commonly used Tomahawks have warheads with an explosive power of approximately 136 kg of TNT.

Trevor Ball, a former U.S. Army explosive ordnance disposal technician who works with Bellingcat, also identified the missile in the video as a Tomahawk, as did another weapons expert, Chris Cobb-Smith, director of Chiron Resources, a security and logistics agency.

Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stated at a news conference Wednesday that U.S. forces were carrying out attacks in southern Iran at the time the naval base and school were attacked. A map he presented showed that an area including Minab, near the Strait of Hormuz, had been targeted in the first 100 hours of the operation, although it did not explicitly identify the town.

“Along the southern axis, the USS Abraham Lincoln strike group has continued to exert pressure from the sea along the southeastern side of the coast and has been reducing naval capacity along the strait,” the general said.

This is not the only time that General Caine has acknowledged the role Tomahawk missiles played in the early hours of the war.

“The first shooters at sea were Tomahawks launched by the US Navy,” he said in a briefing with reporters at the Pentagon on March 2, when the Navy “began conducting strikes on Iran’s southern flank.”

In June, a Navy submarine launched more than two dozen Tomahawks at a nuclear facility in Isfahan, Iran, as part of the 12-Day War.

Shawn McCreesh contributed reporting. Kuyper’s Shawn Paik and McKinnon contributed to the video production.

Malachy Browne is business director of The Times’ Visual Investigations team. He was part of teams awarded the Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting in 2020 and 2023.

John Ismay is a Pentagon reporter for The Times. He served as an explosive ordnance disposal officer in the United States Navy.