A surveillance still shows children fleeing after an object exploded in a residential street in Al-Jami’a neighborhood, Dujail. Five children were injured by shrapnel and debris.
Salah Al-Din
Five children injured in Dujail after unidentified object crashes near home
SALAH AL-DIN — Five children were injured Saturday evening when an unidentified object fell in front of a home in the Al-Jami’a neighborhood of central Dujail, according to security and health officials.
A video circulated online showed children fleeing in panic after an explosion disrupted their play. Authorities have not yet identified the object, but the Interior Ministry attributed the incident to “the fall of a foreign object.”
“At 6:45 p.m. on Saturday, June 21, five children in the Al-Jami’a neighborhood of Dujail, within the Samarra Operations Command sector, were injured due to the fall of a foreign object, according to the explosives experts’ report,” the ministry said in a statement.
“Surveillance footage shows the children were hit by shrapnel and scattered gravel as a result of the object’s impact while they were in front of their homes. They were taken to the hospital for treatment. The injuries were minor, and all of them were discharged after receiving medical care,” the statement added.
The incident may be part of a broader wave of aerial activity across Iraq. Earlier that day, a suspected Iranian drone crashed and exploded on Mount Qarachogh in Nineveh’s Makhmur district, where wreckage bearing Persian writing was retrieved by the Iraqi Army. Another unidentified object was also reported in Sulaymaniyah’s Dukan district, following several drone-related incidents this past week.
Since June 16, drones have been intercepted or crashed near the U.S. consulate in Erbil, the villages of Sherawa, Shamamak, and Gomezal, as regional hostilities between Iran and Israel continue. The surge in aerial incidents has prompted Iraqi authorities to close the country’s airspace to civilian flights due to security threats.