New satellite imagery shows several destroyed American-made F-14 fighter jets at an Iranian airbase that was recently targeted by Israeli strikes.
The images, collected on Monday by the US spatial intelligence firm Vantor and obtained by Business Insider, show visible wreckage of at least two F-14 Tomcats on the apron at the 8th Tactical Air Base in Isfahan, a city in central Iran.
The base is a hub for the Iranian Air Force’s fleet of vintage F-14s. An image collected on February 22, before the conflict, shows dispersed Tomcats and what Vantor identified as F-7s, the export variant of the Chinese Chengdu J-7.
At least two of the F-14s were destroyed by airstrikes — one of the jets was completely replaced by a massive scorch mark. Several F-7s were also attacked.
The Israeli military said on Sunday that its forces carried out airstrikes at the Isfahan airport, targeting an undisclosed number of F-14 fighter jets two days after it bombed more than a dozen Iranian aircraft at the Mehrabad airport in Tehran.
Israel previously attacked Iran’s aging F-14 fleet during the June 2025 war between the two countries.
Iran is the only remaining operator of the F-14, a legacy multi-role fighter jet manufactured by the American firm formerly known as Grumman Aerospace Corporation, now the defense giant Northrop Grumman.
The fighter jet, designed for carrier launch, was introduced by the US Navy in the 1970s and flew combat missions for decades until 2006, when the Pentagon replaced the F-14 with the F/A-18 Super Hornet. The Tomcat remained a celebrated aircraft, though, thanks in part to its appearance in the 1986 and 2022 “Top Gun” movies.
The US sold nearly 80 F-14s to Iran in the years before the 1979 Iranian revolution ended what was once a partnership between the two countries. In the years since, Tehran’s fleet has slowly declined as maintenance and logistical challenges grew. It is now believed to have only a few dozen left, though the exact figure is uncertain.
International sanctions and embargoes have rendered Iran’s air force largely obsolete. It’s a hodgepodge of American-made jets like F-14s and F-5s and Soviet-era planes such as Su-24s and MiG-29s. It’s limited airpower has forced Tehran to rely on ballistic missiles and attack drones to project power.
The US and Israel have heavily targeted Iranian aircraft, as well as its ballistic missile and drone capabilities, since they began their intensive bombing campaign on February 28. Adm. Brad Cooper, the head of US Central Command, said American forces alone had struck more than 5,500 targets inside Iran as of Wednesday.
American military leadership has assessed that Iranian ballistic missile and drone attacks across the Middle East have decreased by 90% and 83%, respectively, since the war began.
The war has left hundreds of people dead inside Iran and across the wider Middle East and has upended regional travel and oil markets.
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