NPR's satellite imagery analysis confirms that the strike on Shajareh Tayyebeh elementary school in Minab caused destruction extending into adjacent residential blocks beyond the school compound. The blast radius visible from orbit is wider than any ground-level account had indicated. The death toll from this single strike has been revised upward three times — from 148 to 165 confirmed dead, with Iran's Health Ministry stating approximately 180 young children killed. Thousands attended a mass funeral in Minab's central square on Tuesday. The satellite evidence suggests even those figures may be incomplete.
The expansion of the known damage zone raises immediate questions about the casualty accounting. Minab is a densely built city in Hormozgan province. If residential structures within the blast radius were occupied at the time of the strike, deaths extend beyond the school population. Independent investigations by The New York Times, CNN, and Time identified debris at the site consistent with a US Tomahawk cruise missile using outdated targeting data. A blast radius reaching multiple residential blocks aligns with the explosive yield of a Block IV Tomahawk variant's 1,000-pound warhead — though no government has confirmed the weapon.
Iran's internet has operated at 1% of normal capacity for six consecutive days, assessed by NetBlocks and Georgia Tech's Internet Outage Detection and Analysis project as the most severe communications shutdown in the country's recorded history. Ground-level information reaches the outside world through Iranian state channels, local human rights contacts, or not at all. Overhead imagery bypasses this blackout entirely, and what it shows contradicts the narrower picture available from surface reporting.
The US military stated five days ago that it was 'looking into' civilian harm reports from Minab. The IDF claimed 'no knowledge' of any strike in the area. Neither government has released battle damage assessment data or responded to the geolocated footage and debris analysis published by three independent news organisations. NPR's satellite evidence — physical, measurable, collected from orbit — now exists independently of either government's cooperation or acknowledgement.
