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An explosion deep within Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility has destroyed much of the installation and trapped about 240 personnel deep underground, according to a former intelligence officer of the Islamic regime.
The previously secret nuclear site has become a center for Iran’s nuclear activity because of the 2,700 centrifuges enriching uranium to the 20-percent level. A further enrichment to weapons grade would take only weeks, experts say.
The level of enrichment has been a major concern to Israeli officials, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly has warned about the 20-percent enriched stockpile.
The explosion occurred Monday, the day before Israeli elections weakened Netanyahu’s political control.
Iran, to avoid alarm, had converted part of the stockpile to fuel plates for use in the Tehran Research Reactor. However, days after the recent failed talks with the International Atomic Energy Agency, Iranian officials announced the enrichment process will not stop even “for a moment.”
The regime’s uranium enrichment process takes place at two known sites: the Natanz facility with more than 10,000 centrifuges and Fordow with more than 2,700. The regime currently has enough low-grade (3.5 percent) uranium stockpiled for six nuclear bombs if further enriched.
Get the inside story in Reza Kahlili’s “A Time To Betray” and learn how the Islamic regime “bought the bomb” in “Atomic Iran.
However, more time is needed for conversion of the low-grade uranium than what would be needed for a stockpile at 20 percent. It takes 225 kilograms of enriched uranium at the 20-percent level to further enrich to the 90-percent level for one nuclear bomb.
According to a source in the security forces protecting Fordow, an explosion on Monday at 11:30 a.m. Tehran time rocked the site, which is buried deep under a mountain and immune not only to airstrikes but to most bunker-buster bombs. The report of the blast came via Hamidreza Zakeri, formerly with the Islamic regime’s Ministry of Intelligence and National Security,
The blast shook facilities within a radius of three miles. Security forces have enforced a no-traffic radius of 15 miles, and the Tehran-Qom highway was shut down for several hours after the blast, the source said. As of Wednesday afternoon, rescue workers had failed to reach the trapped personnel.
The site, about 300 feet under a mountain, had two elevators which now are out of commission. One elevator descended about 240 feet and was used to reach centrifuge chambers. The other went to the bottom to carry heavy equipment and transfer uranium hexafluoride. One emergency staircase reaches the bottom of the site and another one was not complete. The source said the emergency exit southwest of the site is unreachable.
The regime believes the blast was sabotage and the explosives could have reached the area disguised as equipment or in the uranium hexafluoride stock transferred to the site, the source said. The explosion occurred at the third centrifuge chambers, with the high-grade enriched uranium reserves below them.
The information was passed on to U.S. officials but has not been verified or denied by the regime or other sources within the regime.
Though the news of the explosion has not been independently verified, other sources previously have provided WND with information on plans for covert operations against Iran’s nuclear facilities as an option before going to war. The hope is to avoid a larger-scale conflict. Israel, the U.S. and other allies already have concluded the Islamic regime has crossed its red line in its quest for nuclear weapons, other sources have said.
However, this information was not revealed for security reasons until several days ago when sources said the regime’s intelligence agency, through an alleged spy in the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, had learned of the decision to conduct sabotage on Iran’s nuclear sites on a much larger scale than before.
As reported, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called an urgent meeting Tuesday with the intelligence minister, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization and other officials to discuss the threat, and now it’s clear the meeting included the sabotage at Fordow.
Several Iranian nuclear scientists have been assassinated in recent years. Last year, saboteurs struck the power supply to the Fordow facility, temporarily disrupting production. And a computer worm called Stuxnet, believed to have originated in the U.S., set Iran’s plans for nuclear weapons back substantially.
The 5+1 (the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany) hope to resume talks with Iran over its illicit nuclear program. The talks ended last year after regime officials refused to negotiate.
Sources in the Islamic regime previously have revealed exclusively to WND the existence of:
- A secret nuclear site in Najaf Abad.
- A list of Iranian scientists working on a nuclear bomb.
- A secret uranium enrichment site in Khondab, where the Russians and North Korean scientists are helping with Iran’s nuclear bomb program.
- The secret bio-weapons site in Marzanabad, where, with the help of Russia, Iran has mastered production of eight microbial agents, arming its missiles with biological warheads.
- Another nuclear site at Bonab, where, with the help of Russians, uranium enrichment is taking place using laser technology.
WarSclerotic 
January 26, 2013 at 3:15 PM
Yes it accurate i have from 4 sources now.
January 26, 2013 at 3:18 PM
Every story I’ve seen references Kalili as the only source. Do you have confirmation of his story?
January 26, 2013 at 6:05 PM
I wonder if it is iran playing games myself as 3 of the sources are indeed Kalili,The fourth wont comment on the source
January 26, 2013 at 3:38 PM
Im not buying this story at all.
January 26, 2013 at 3:44 PM
In the meantime, a strong chess move against the ayatollahs:
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/01/26/holocaust-film-covertly-beamed-into-iran-by-wiesenthal-center/
January 26, 2013 at 5:25 PM
“…with information on plans for covert operations against Iran’s nuclear facilities as an option before going to war.”
Hell, Tehran has exercised that option for decades. Now it’s time we do the same. Too many US soldiers have been killed and maimed by Tehran’s covert war in Iraq.
“Israel, the U.S. and other allies already have concluded the Islamic regime has crossed its red line…”
Let’s hope the ‘red line’ has finally found a home.
January 26, 2013 at 9:09 PM
Egypt is in trouble again tonight, Groups are threatening to shut down the suez canal
January 26, 2013 at 9:16 PM
Reports of ships being shot at in suez canal, groups trying to storm canal command center – alarabiya
January 27, 2013 at 2:49 AM
Ok what on earth….
http://hisz.rsoe.hu/alertmap/site/?pageid=event_summary&edis_id=EX-20130126-38002-IRN#.UQR2WlaGJDI.twitter
Explosion in Iran on Saturday, 26 January, 2013 at 05:04 (05:04 AM) UTC.
Fordow Nuclear Facility
January 27, 2013 at 2:56 AM
Is this a second one? Or just reporting Mondays alleged explosion? hmm strange days indeed…
January 27, 2013 at 4:24 AM
It’s the same one.
If you klick on the description tab you can see the WND-story in all its glory.
January 27, 2013 at 3:22 AM
Timing would make sense to me. If Netanyahu has any desire at all to stop Iran he can’t sit on his hands much longer.
January 27, 2013 at 4:18 AM
Hamid Reza Zakeri the source given in the article is a former Iranian agent who defected in 2001.
In 2004 he served as a witness in a German court case.
http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/2004/Abdelghani-Mzoudi30jan04.htm
I find it hard to believe that he still has contact to persons with access to secret information in Iran.
If that were truly the case it would be better for the Iranians to liquidate him or even better, give him false information.
That said, it is still possible, that the article is truthful.
The nuclear facility is far away enough (20 miles) from Quom that the blast may have gone largely unnoticed.
Keep also in mind that on the same day there was a 5.3 mag earth quake in Iran. There is a lot of seismic activity going on and there were quakes before and after that day in Iran and Iraq
Suppose that this explosion did really happen.
Confirmation would depend on the willingness of the Iranians to report it to the outside world.
Confirmation would force them to act and make good on their threats against Israel and the US, which may not be opportune for them at the moment.
January 27, 2013 at 5:31 AM
Still more discussion and speculation:
http://atimetobetray.com/blog/debkafile-covers-my-report-on-fordo-explosion-with-a-meaningful-last-paragraph/
January 27, 2013 at 1:52 PM
GERMAN NEWSPAPER CLAIMS THAT AN IRAN EXPERT WITH INTELLIGENCE CONTACTS CONFIRMED KAHLILI’S STORY.
The reputable and serious news paper “Die Welt” claims in their sunday edition “WELT AM SONNTAG” that another Iran expert confirmed Kahlili’s story.
The article is written in German.
I’ve translated only the relevant part:
“After Khalili has published his report in Thursday on the news website WND, the article spread quickly among experts on Iran and the Iranian nuclear programm.
Up to now that report has not been confirmed by the Iranian side and it was unclear, how reliable Khalili’s sources are. Now an Iran expert with intelligence contacts has confirmed to the “Welt am Sonntag” that the explosion did really happen. According to these informations not 240 but at least 190 workers in the nuclear site have been cut off from the outside world.”
http://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article113155950/Experte-meldet-schwere-Explosion-in-Atomanlage.html
January 27, 2013 at 6:17 PM
Thanks for this article ! I read it in German, and your translation is correct. That is exactly the confirmation we were looking for.
Poor mad Iranian scientists ! They were not intelligent enough to safely manipulate such highly dangerous materials. They should have never tried to deal with anything more complicated than Lego bricks.
January 27, 2013 at 6:46 PM
Your’e welcome.
BTW, are you a fan of Ephraim Kishon?
I rember now, that my teacher read something from him.
That was decades ago and I can’t remember what it was.
January 27, 2013 at 7:45 PM
Yes, I like Kishon (the Woody Allen of Israel) very much. I recommend his books and his movies : Sallah Shabati (1964, most popular movie in the history of Israel), with Haim Topol, is a great comedy about a Yemeni family arriving in Israel to end up in a shack in a Kibbutz, hoping and doing its best to get an apartment (you hear the word Shikun a lot). Kishon makes fun of life in the Kibbutz, of the elections, of corruption, of the young idealist intellectuals,…this movie is a riot !
Extracts with English subtitles :
History of this movie :
The famous song of Haim Topol :
Another fantastic comedy by Ephraïm Kishon is Te’alat Blaumilch (The Big Dig – 1969), about the incompetence of the administration, and its crazy consequences after a man escaped from a mental institution starts digging holes in the middle of the busiest street in Tel Aviv, and everyone believes he is a worker sent by the public works administration. But sent by who exactly ? A mystery which breeds conspiracy theories. And then politicians intervene !
Extract with English subtitles :
Full movie with Russian subtitles :
January 27, 2013 at 10:07 PM
Very funny and sometimes deep and dark humor.
The clip with the digging guy was absolutely hilarious.
Reminds me of a night a very long time ago, when I and my girl friend where laughing a little bit too loud when shortly before midnight my neighbour stormed to my door and shouted like an insane madman: “Quiet! We want to sleep! Stop laughing!…”.
He must have woken the whole house up.
January 27, 2013 at 11:51 PM
I am glad you appreciated it.
Long live the spirit of Ephraïm Kishon !