Iranian attack on Saudi air base heavily damages key US surveillance aircraft |
An important American early warning and control aircraft was heavily damaged in an Iranian attack on an airbase in Saudi Arabia, according to officials cited by The Wall Street Journal and footage posted online on Sunday.
Iran’s strike on the Prince Sultan Air Base on Friday damaged the Boeing E-3 Sentry, an Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) plane that uses advanced radar to track aircraft and missiles from hundreds of kilometers away, providing commanders with a real-time picture of the battlefield from the air.
The Journal cited US and Arab officials as saying that an E-3 Sentry was among the aircraft damaged in the attack. Footage posted online also appeared to show a heavily damaged Boeing E-3 Sentry.
The US reportedly only had 16 operational E-3 Sentry planes before the attack on the airbase in Saudi Arabia, down from a fleet of around 30 decades ago.
The report said that the E-3 Sentry fleet has no easy replacements ready for service, and that the nearest replacement, the E-7 Wedgetail, is projected to cost $700 million.
New image reportedly showing the USAF E-3 Sentry destroyed in an Iranian attack at Prince Sultan Airbase on Friday. Matches 81-0005, an E-3C seen deployed to the base in recent weeks. pic.twitter.com/zRVzzkEPeU — OSINTtechnical (@Osinttechnical) March 29, 2026
New image reportedly showing the USAF E-3 Sentry destroyed in an Iranian attack at Prince Sultan Airbase on Friday.
Matches 81-0005, an E-3C seen deployed to the base in recent weeks. pic.twitter.com/zRVzzkEPeU
— OSINTtechnical (@Osinttechnical) March 29, 2026
The attack, involving at least one missile and several drones, wounded 12 US service members and damaged several refueling planes, according to Saturday reports.
Since the war with Iran began on February 28, more than 300 US service members have been wounded and 13 were killed in action.
In an interview with NBC on Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that satellite images taken by Russia of the Prince Sultan Air Base were shared with Iran just days prior to the attack.
Zelensky said he was “100 percent” confident Russia was responsible for providing Iran with intelligence to help them target US forces across the Middle East.
“I think that it’s in Russia’s interest to help Iranians. And I don’t believe — I know — that they share information,” Zelenskyy said in the interview.
Zelensky shared with NBC a summary of the daily presidential briefing he receives from Ukraine’s spy agencies, which showed that Russian satellites took images of the airbase on March 20, March 23 and March 25. The successive photographs suggested an attack was being planned, he said in the interview.
“We know that if they make images once, they are preparing. If they make images a second time, it’s like a simulation. The third time it means that in one or two days, they will attack,” he said. NBC stated that its briefing with Zelensky did not include evidence of Russia’s satellite imagery or specify how Ukraine had acquired the intelligence.
The airbase was previously targeted by Iran, damaging but not destroying five US Air Force refueling planes on the ground, according to reports on March 14.
Earlier in the war, US President Donald Trump said it was inconsequential if Russia has provided Iran with information to help Tehran target American military personnel and assets in the Middle East.
Trump dismissed the import of such information-sharing after he attended the dignified transfer for six Army reservists who were killed in a drone strike in Kuwait on March 1, the day after the US and Israel launched their war on Iran.
He stopped short of confirming reports by The Associated Press and other news outlets that US intelligence officials believe Russia has provided Iran with such targeting information. But if Moscow is passing on such details, he said, Iran was getting little out of it.
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