Aircraft, weapons and naval equipment
Heavy bombers: B-1B, B-2 and B-52H
These are different bomber types, not interchangeable icons. Official historical releases document B-1 deep-strike activity on 1 March, B-52 support on 3 March and B-2 take-offs on 18 March 2026. The releases establish reported participation, not which aircraft caused each mapped impact. Event dates differ from publication dates: the B-2 footage was posted on 24 March. A generic plane symbol does not identify a bomber model, sortie count or target assignment.
Sources: B-1 historical release · B-52 historical release · B-2 historical release
Carrier aircraft: F/A-18E/F Super Hornet
The Super Hornet combines fighter and attack roles and operates from aircraft carriers. Navy imagery documents F/A-18F operations from USS Abraham Lincoln during the opening phase. The image caption and metadata differ by a day, so this guide does not use that photograph to establish an exact launch chronology. A carrier-aircraft symbol represents an activity type; it does not identify the carrier's position or a particular aircraft's track.
Sources: US Navy platform description · Opening-phase Navy imagery
Electronic attack: EA-18G Growler
The Growler is an electronic-attack aircraft whose documented role includes suppressing hostile air defences. It is not simply another bomber. A Navy photograph records a Growler launching from Abraham Lincoln on 2 March 2026. Participation does not establish which radar or communications system that mission affected, nor prove an individual claimed outage. The map therefore does not assign electronic-warfare effects to specific impact markers.
Sources: NAVAIR Growler description · 2 March Navy imagery
Airborne support: KC-135 tanker
A tanker supplies fuel to other aircraft in the air. Military footage documents a KC-135 refuelling a B-52H on 20 March 2026; that footage was published on 2 April. This supports explaining airborne refuelling as a historical activity. It does not establish an exact refuelling orbit, launch direction, target, attack time or current position. Support-aircraft activity alone is not evidence that a strike is imminent.
Sources: KC-135 and B-52 refuelling record
Tomahawk: a cruise missile, not an aircraft
Tomahawk is a long-range, subsonic land-attack cruise missile. Navy footage identifies an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer launching Tomahawks during the campaign on 3 March 2026. A missile symbol should be read separately from a piloted-aircraft symbol. Neither its animation nor its dashed connector reproduces a verified missile route. General launch capability does not establish that a particular ship or submarine fired a particular mapped strike.
Sources: NAVAIR Tomahawk description · 3 March destroyer launch record
One-way attack drones and reconnaissance drones
CENTCOM announced first combat use of its low-cost one-way attack drones on 28 February 2026; an earlier deployment statement names LUCAS platforms. This is a government-reported use claim. A one-way attack drone is distinct from a reusable reconnaissance aircraft such as an MQ-9. A generic drone symbol cannot establish a specific model, operator, payload or responsibility for an impact without event-specific evidence.
Sources: CENTCOM combat announcement · LUCAS deployment statement · MQ-9 role
Naval vessels: carrier versus destroyer
USS Abraham Lincoln is a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier, providing a platform for carrier aviation. Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers are a different type; official March footage shows one launching Tomahawks. Neither type should be called a battleship. The theatre's generic ship silhouette marks illustrative regional naval activity. It does not identify an individual hull, class, current position, patrol track or verified launch point.
Sources: Carrier operations record · Destroyer launch record
Iranian missile names: attributed identification
Reuters reported on 18 March 2026 that an IRGC statement named Khorramshahr 4 and Qadr missiles in an attack on the Tel Aviv area. The model names are an IRGC claim carried by Reuters. They are not independently established identifications of every missile, and must not be assigned to every purple map marker. This guide does not infer weapon effectiveness, interception percentages or a target-specific loadout from those names.
Sources: Reuters report, syndicated
Reported manoeuvres and support roles
Opening air-and-sea operations
CENTCOM said the 28 February opening used weapons from air, land and sea against command-and-control, air-defence, missile/drone launch and airfield categories. This describes the belligerent's declared emphasis, not an independently audited target list. The IDF separately claimed about 200 fighter jets and roughly 500 objectives in western and central Iran. These claims do not establish the map's drawn tracks.
Sources: CENTCOM opening release · IDF 28 February updates
Deep strike, launch and recovery
The B-1 release describes operations against missile capabilities inside Iran on 1 March. Navy imagery documents carrier aircraft launching and recovering aboard Abraham Lincoln. These are historical activity descriptions. They do not supply navigational routes, precise sea positions or aircraft-to-target assignments; the theatre's curves remain schematic connectors.
Sources: B-1 release · Carrier recovery imagery
Refuelling and electronic-warfare support
Aerial refuelling means transferring fuel while airborne; electronic attack is a different support role involving electronic warfare. Dated footage supports the former and official platform descriptions explain the latter. Neither a support-aircraft sighting nor an animated connector establishes a particular attack time, current orbit, radar gap or forthcoming manoeuvre.
Sources: Dated refuelling record · Growler role
NOTAMs and civil-aviation risk notices
Read the document type before reading a warning
A NOTAM communicates a time-sensitive aviation condition or hazard. An EASA Conflict Zone Information Bulletin is a civil-aviation risk advisory, not the same document as an airspace-closure NOTAM. A notice preceding an attack is historical context; by itself it does not establish advance knowledge, an attack order or an imminent-strike countdown.
Sources: FAA NOTAM definition · EASA Iran risk advisory
Decode a NOTAM: identity, validity, place and levels
Read the issuing authority and exact ID. A identifies the airport or FIR; B and C give effective and expiration times, normally UTC; D gives any schedule; E describes the condition; F and G give lower and upper levels. NOTAMR replaces and NOTAMC cancels a notice. The Q-line's geographic circle is a filtering envelope and can exceed the actual activity polygon: it is not a blast radius or automatically an exact restriction boundary.
Sources: FAA international NOTAM fields · FAA time conventions · UK CAA NOTAM guide
January–February 2026: archived EASA advisory
EASA 2026-02-R1 was issued 16 January and revised 12 February, extending validity to 31 March without changing its content. It covered all altitudes in Tehran FIR OIIX and addressed air-defence alert and misidentification risk. The source is now marked withdrawn. It predates the 28 February opening but is not a NOTAM or proof of a warning about that particular attack. Exact UTC issue times were not supplied.
Sources: Original EASA 2026-02-R1
19 February rocket activity: reported notice, original not retrieved
Reuters reported on 18 February that an Iranian notice displayed on the FAA website described planned rocket launches in southern Iran on 19 February, 03:30–13:30 UTC. The original notice number, full boundary, altitude limits and cancellation history were not authenticated in this check. This remains an attributed report, not a verified restriction polygon or evidence that it signalled the 28 February strikes.
Sources: Reuters, 18 February 2026
July–September 2026: later risk context
EASA CZIB-2026-04-R2 was issued 8 July and revised 30 September, with validity extended to 16 November. Checked 31 October, it covered Tehran FIR OIIX at all levels and recommended non-operation and continued monitoring. This is later conflict-risk context, not a notice preceding the opening strikes. Exact issue and expiry clock times were not published on the page; its status can change after this check.
Sources: Original EASA CZIB-2026-04-R2
Original historical NOTAM: FAA KICZ A0002/20
Created 8 January 2020 at 00:07 UTC and effective at 00:10 UTC, this original security NOTAM covered Tehran FIR OIIX, SFC–UNL, with printed expiry PERM. It restricted specified US civil-aviation categories, subject to its provisions. It is a 2020 historical document, not a new 2026 strike warning. No authenticated original 2026 pre-strike NOTAM polygon was established in this research.
Sources: Original FAA NOTAM PDF
Where reports concentrate — and what counts mean
Where the selected reports cluster
Within this curated record, early rounds span Tehran and central/northwestern Iran; later rounds repeatedly return to the southern coast, Hormuz islands and surrounding sea. This describes the selected reports' geography, not a complete count or measured strike intensity. The phase summaries and timeline records are different editorial structures and must not be added together as strike totals.
Sources: Curated Iran source data
Record counts are not strike counts
The checked file contains 55 event records. Removing protest crackdown and execution entries leaves 47 war-related hit/civilian records: seven indexed to Tehran, seven to a vague nationwide placeholder, seven to the vague Gulf of Oman area and four to Bandar Abbas. A record can summarize multiple sites, attacks or days. These counts do not independently verify events, quantify total munitions or rank damage.
Sources: Curated Iran source data, checked 31 October
Why there is no numerical strike-intensity heatmap
The dataset lacks comparable strike-by-strike geolocation. Vague nationwide and sea-area placeholders cannot become precise hotspots. Marker halos are graphic area symbols, not impact footprints, blast radii or measured damage zones. Protest-crackdown records remain separate from military-impact concentration. The map adds no new exact military-site coordinates or vulnerability rankings.
Sources: Curated source methodology and locations
