Nurse Bara'a messaged from the basement of the M2 hospital in east Aleppo: "If this hospital falls on top of us and we get stuck under the rubble, please no pictures. Don't forget our dignity."

The hospital, one of the largest serving the opposition-held side of the city, had been hit hours earlier and she could hear warplanes circling overhead.

“I’m not afraid for myself, just for my patients,” she told the Telegraph from an underground bunker, where she was hiding with 90 patients and injured colleagues. The intensive care unit had been destroyed in the attack, leaving many victims of the previous days’ bombings without medical care.

M2 was hit around 4am, minutes before another hospital, M10. Both were put out of service.