Iran Claims US Pilot Ejected South of Tehran

Iranian state media said Friday that a US pilot or pilots had ejected over southwestern Iran, and urged Iranians in the area to help hunt them down. US Central Command has not confirmed, but the New York Times quotes US and Israeli officials who say that a fighter jet was indeed shot down and that a search for survivors was beginning.

• The TV channel in Iran's Kohkilouyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province initially urged viewers who see Americans to "shoot them as soon as you see them," per the AP. Then it changed the instructions, saying police want Iranians to hand over any downed American pilots alive to security agencies to "receive a precious prize."
• State media also released photos of what it said was the wreckage of a US fighter jet shot down by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. State media claimed it was an F-35 stealth fighter, but the photos appear to show the wreckage of US Air Force F-15 jet, CNN reports.

• The photos showed pieces of wreckage, the largest around as big as a person. "From the structure it certainly looks like an F-15, and from the tail flash stripe markings, from the 48th Fighter Wing, based at RAF Lakenheath in the United Kingdom," former Royal Australian Air Force officer Peter Layton, a fellow at the Griffith Asia Institute, tells CNN.
• State media also shared images online of what appeared to be American aircraft flying over the area, including helicopters, planes, and drones, the AP reports. A major explosion from an airstrike struck Iran's capital, Tehran, around the same time Friday afternoon. It wasn't clear what had been hit. Kohkilouyeh and Boyer-Ahmad is about 310 miles southwest of Tehran. It is an intensely rural, mountainous area home to around 600,000 people.

This story was updated with new details.