One of the psychics claimed that the general was held in a brick building with a red roof, and another guessed that the hostage was being held in Padua, a small city in the north.

Footage showed two gutted cars and a deep crater on a debris-strewn street lined by bare trees, and a red brick schoolhouse with its windows blown out and roof partly ripped off.

Securing the rope at ground level, I went up to the roof, swung the barrel out and loaded the brick into it.