New satellite images have revealed the damaged sustained to a US air base in Qatar following an Iranian missile strike last month. The attack on the Al Udeid Air Base outside of Doha likely hit a geodesic dome housing equipment used by the Americans for secure communications, according to analysis by The Associated Press show.
Tehran’s strike on June 23 came as a response to the US bombing three nuclear sites in the capital. It also provided the Islamic Republic a way to retaliate that quickly led to a ceasefire brokered by President Donald Trump, ending the 12-day Iran-Israel war. Overall, it did little damage, likely because the US evacuated its aircraft from the base home to the forward headquarters of the its military’s Central Command ahead of the attack.
Mr Trump also said Iran signalled when and how it would retaliate, allowing US and Qatari air defence to prepare for the attack.
The strike briefly disrupted air travel in the Middle East, but otherwise didn’t spark the regional war some feared it would.
The satellite images from Planet Labs PBC show the base before and after the attack. They show a satellite dish inside of the dome, known as a radome.
Two days after Tehran’s strike, the dome is gone, with some damage visible on a nearby building. The rest of the base appears largely untouched in the images.
It’s possible that a fragment or other debris hit the dome, but the damage is likely down to the attack given the level of destruction, possibly caused by a bomb-carrying drone given the limited visible damage to surrounding structures, AP said.
Mr Trump described the attack as a “very weak response”, saying 14 missiles were fired, 13 intercepted and one “set free” as it was going in a “nonthreatening” direction.
He wrote on Truth Social: “I want to thank Iran for giving us early notice, which made it possible for no lives to be lost, and nobody to be injured.”
Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard insisted the air base had been the “target of a destructive and powerful missile attack”.
The Supreme National Security Council also claimed the base had been “smashed”, but did not provide any specific damage assessments.
Cleric Ahmad Alamolhoda said: “All equipment of the base was completely destroyed and now the U.S. command stream and connection from Al Udeid base to its other military bases have been completely cut.”