Dubai –
An explosion that rocked the capital of Iran occurred in an area in its eastern mountains that analysts think hides a system of tunnels or missile production sites, photographs show Saturday.
What erupted in the incident on Friday morning that launched a fireball into the sky near Tehran was unclear, as was the cause.
The unusual response by the Iranian government after the explosion, however, highlights the sensitive nature of an area near where international inspectors suspect that the Islamic Republic conducted tests with strong explosives two decades ago for nuclear weapons.
The blast shook homes and lit the horizon early Friday morning in the Alborz Mountains. The state television later broadcast a segment from what it described as the site of the blast.
One of his reporters stood in front of what appeared to be large blackened gas cylinders, although the camera remained stationary and showed nothing of the surroundings. Defense ministry spokesman Davood Abdi attributed the blast to a gas leak he did not identify and said that no one was killed.
Abdi described the site as a “public area,” raising the question of why military officials and not civilian firefighters were in charge. The state television report did not clarify it.
Satellite photos of the area, some 20 kilometers (12.5 miles) east of central Tehran, showed hundreds of meters of charred scrub not seen in images taken in the weeks leading up to the incident. The building near the charred marks resembles the installation seen on television images.
The gas warehouse is close to what analysts describe as the Khojir missile installation. The blast appears to have rocked a Shahid Bakeri Industrial Group facility, which produces the rocket boosters, said Fabian Hinz, a researcher at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Monterey, California. (I)
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