SAS sniper heroes foil ISIS truck bomb horror on Syria-Iraq border

Isis fighters had packed a convoy of trucks with explosives and planned to drive them into a packed market before detonating them.

Army chiefs were tipped off about the plot. But they were unable to stop it with air strikes after the terrorists surrounded the trucks with a human shield of refugees.

So instead the SAS crackshots were called in to stop them.

The sharpshooters were armed with the world’s most powerful rife, the Barrett M82 – which can cut a man in half from more than a mile away.

They fired on the lead vehicle, stopping it in its tracks, before taking out the other two lorries.

A senior Army source said: "The SAS snipers were lying in wait about 800 yards from the main road.

"The convoy couldn’t be attacked in an airstrike because civilians had been forced to drive cars between the lorries, so the only option was to use snipers.”

Our insider added: "The lead vehicle was hit first and the engine block was split in two.

"The driver seemed to be aware he had been fired on and the other two trucks tried to bypass him.

"We took out those two vehicles, killing one of the drivers in the process. The others fled, followed by some IS guards.

"Once they had gone, the civilians who were part of the human shield, also fled. At that point we called in an air strike.”

US Air Force jets dropped two 500lb bombs on the trucks, destroying them.

Intelligence confirmed the terrorists were planning to attack the town and cause hundreds of casualties.

The defence source said: "This was a classic special forces operation. We executed the operation perfectly.

"There were no civilian casualties and we saved hundreds of lives.”

(dailystar.co.uk)