US drops 900-kg bunker buster bomb on Iran’s Isfahan, Trump shares video

Mangalore Today News Network

Tehran, Mar 31, 2026: US President Donald Trump has shared a video of a massive explosion in Iran, which, according to media reports, took place in the city of Isfahan in the early hours of Tuesday. The footage shows a series of blasts, followed by massive fires lighting up the night sky in orange hues.

Trump did not provide any context to the video, but media reports claim it’s of the US and Israeli joint strikes on a major ammunition depot in Isfahan, an Iranian city with a population of 2.3 million and home to the Badr military airbase. 

According to a US official cited by The Wall Street Journal, US forces hit the ammunition depot in Isfahan with 2,000-pound (approx. 907-kilogram) bunker buster bombs. "A high volume of bunker busters, or penetrator munitions, was used for the strike," the official said.

Reports have claimed that the attack triggered a series of powerful secondary explosions that sent towering fireballs and shockwaves across the area. The strike has heightened fears of escalation as the war entered its second month, even as Pakistan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Turkey met to seek a diplomatic off-ramp.

Recent reports have suggested that Iran may have moved highly enriched uranium stockpiles, estimated to be around 540kg, to an underground facility in Isfahan. The city had also been targeted previously during a US strike last year in the summer under Operation Midnight Hammer, which focused on its nuclear facilities.

The reports of the strikes came a day after Trump, on Monday, threatened widespread destruction of Iran’s energy resources and other vital infrastructure, including nuclear facilities and water plants, if a deal to end the war is not reached "shortly".

Trump had said the US would destroy Iranian energy sites if discussions with a "new and more reasonable regime" didn’t amount to a deal and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz. 

US President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have repeatedly alleged that Iran was close to building a nuclear weapon, a claim not supported by the UN nuclear watchdog, and that comes despite Trump saying he "obliterated" key sites in attacks last year.
What Are Bunker Busters

’Bunker busters’ are bombs designed with hardened steel casings that allow them to penetrate through layers of soil and concrete and explode only after reaching specific depths.

"They actually often have smaller explosive payloads... but it is the casing that allows them to dig into the ground, kind of like a drill, and then destroy these targets," Ryan Brobst, a munitions expert at US-based think tank Foundation for Defence of Democracies, told broadcaster NPR.

Some even use HTSF, or a ’hard target smart fuse’, that allows it to ’count’ floors it passes through or changes in density when it enters an open chamber like a missile silo before exploding.

Some are even fitted with microphones so they detonate only when they hear voices.

What makes a ’bunker buster’ dangerous is not the volume of explosives it packs – though that is sizeable too – but because it can time the explosion to reach targets other bombs cannot.

’Bunker busters’ aren’t exactly new weapons; they’ve been around since World War II, and the BLU-109, for example, entered service in 1985. But it wasn’t until American military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq – countries with mountainous terrain and deep caves within which command centres were set up – that a need for precision-guided bombs emerged.