Deadly Iran wedding strike likely due to US bomb missing a nearby target

The Pentagon is investigating the high likelihood that an explosion in southern Iran that destroyed a home hosting a wedding celebration was caused by a US bomb that missed a nearby target, a person familiar with the operation said.

The strike on the home, which Iranian officials said killed at least four civilians and injured dozens more, was part of a larger wave of attacks on Tuesday in southern Iran, described by US officials as retaliation for increased threats to US troops and commercial shipping.

US forces launched an airstrike in the coastal town of Kuhestak that targeted a communications complex, a US official said. The complex, which included a small building at its base, sat in a civilian area but was believed to be utilized in part by Iranian forces to conduct operations, the person familiar said.

Six bombs dropped by US Navy jets traveled on a tight pathway toward the tower and all struck the site except for one, which appeared to go astray, said the person, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive operations.

An explosion tore into the roof of the home approximately 440 feet from the tower, according to visuals verified by The Washington Post.

The explosion killed at least two women and two children aged 4 and 16 years old, according to Ali Jafarian, Iran’s deputy health minister, and injured more than 90 others. The Post could not independently verify those figures.

The mishap followed an exhaustive targeting process, which include US personnel working to minimize harm to civilians, the person familiar said, like multiple layers of verifying target locations.

“We’re investigating it because obviously we care. We want to know,” Vice President JD Vance said when asked about the strike in a news conference Thursday.

Central Command, which oversees military operations in the area, said it was aware of reports of civilian casualties and is “looking into them” but declined to provide additional details.

“The US military never targets civilians, unlike the IRGC,” said Navy Capt. Tim Hawkins, a spokesman for Central Command, using the acronym for Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.

Officials are assessing one other possibility for the explosion at the home, including an air defense missile falling out of the sky — a circumstance the person familiar and weapons experts independently said was highly unlikely.

The tower was the only target slated for attack in Kuhestak, the person familiar said, ruling out a scenario that the home was intentionally struck or was mixed up with some other target.

The Post verified photographs and video from the night of the attack and aftermath published on social media to determine locations and precise distances.

Details of the strike were earlier reported by the New York Times and Reuters.

The bombing is among a growing list of US strikes that have killed civilians during the six-month conflict, which has entered a tenuous ceasefire marked by occasional attacks.

The Trump administration has dismissed concerns raised by lawmakers and human rights groups that have alleged airstrikes without due regard for civilians nearby are violations of international law. The Pentagon has mostly dismantled an office focused on mitigating civilian harm and reassigned personnel who investigate such incidents.

An airstrike on an Iranian military compound in the early hours of the war in February struck a nearby school, killing at least 175 people, many of them children, according to Iranian state media. That strike was the result of an error that involved outdated targeting information, The Post previously reported.

Video posted by the Iranian Red Crescent Society from the night of the wedding attack showed people with flashlights rushing into the damaged buildings, and emergency workers appearing to use a hose to douse fires.

“In the new list of war crimes and attacks by the US army on civilian targets in Iran, after schools, stadiums, and residential homes, now add wedding ceremonies to this list too...,” the Iranian Red Crescent Society wrote on X.

It is unclear why the bomb in Tuesday’s strike did not hit its intended target. Guided munitions rely on several precise capabilities, including GPS coordinates, and almost always strike their intended targets, munition experts have said. Errant strikes are rare and typically the result of flawed intelligence, human error or malfunctions on the weapon itself.

The munitions used to target the tower complex were US glide bombs known as Joint Standoff Weapons, or JSOW, the person familiar with the incident said.

Images from an Iranian state news channel showed strike remnants that were consistent with the JSOW’s tail fin and casing, said Trevor Ball, a weapons technical analyst for Armament Research Services who served as an Army explosive ordnance disposal technician. The Post was not able to independently verify the pieces were recovered from the site.

The damage seen is consistent with a variant of JSOW that uses two warheads with about 193 pounds of explosives inside, Ball said. The uniform shape of the crater, plus a spread of fragmentation on the structure and nearby buildings, showed a munition that detonated directly on the roof or exploded right above it, he said.

He ruled out other possibilities for the damage, like an Iranian air defense missile falling onto the home or a weapons depot exploding nearby, because the damage and shrapnel marks would have appeared significantly different.

The JSOW can be manually updated on its way to a target and it is possible they missed by aiming for a narrow segment of the tower, said Mark Cancian, a senior adviser with the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

It is unlikely that electronic jamming or some other interference would alone be sufficient to disrupt the trajectory of a JSOW, which have complementary guidance systems, Cancian said. He said it was “highly likely” the strikes at the tower and home were conducted by US forces after reviewing imagery and other details.

Wes Bryant, who previously served as a targeter in Air Force Special Operations, said military planners are obliged to consider the immediate area when attacking in a populated area.

“Civilian pattern of life should be established prior to attack, and every structure adjacent to the targeted structure should be characterized,” said Bryant, who later served in the Pentagon office focused on mitigating harm to noncombatants.