Call the Midwife fans were reeling last night after a devastating train crash left the lives of two main characters hanging in the balance.
Sister Julienne and Dr Turner, played by Jenny Agutter and Stephen McGann, were flung from their seats as their Chelmsford to Liverpool Street train came off the rails.
The pair were returning from a conference along with young nurse Nancy Corrigan when the driver suffered what looked like a brain haemorrhage.
The runaway train careered through several red signals, eventually colliding with another service.
Now the hit BBC1 show’s 8million fans will have to wait until the series finale on Sunday to find out if either character survives.
The episode ended ominously with Sister Julienne, the head of Nonnatus House, lying motionless among the debris in the smoky carriage.
And young nun Sister Frances (Ella Bruccoleri) looks numb with despair at the prospect of losing her, saying: “Nonnatus House will sink and we will all drown.”
Meanwhile, Poplar GP Dr Turner was also left unconscious, one of his legs horribly mangled.
Nancy, played by Megan Cusack, was in a different carriage and escaped with minor injuries.
Both Agutter and McGann, who is married to the show’s creator and head writer Heidi Thomas, have been in the show since it launched in 2012.
Thomas often ends odd-numbered series with a death – and this is the climax of the 11th run.
As last night’s shocking episode ended, the voiceover by Vanessa Redgrave said ominously: “Sometimes the sky rips open and the earth erupts beneath our feet.
"We stand, if we can stand at all, exposed, vulnerable, pathetic in our frailty.
"Bruised and bleeding we are rendered merely human, never more fragile, never more at risk, never more in need of all the strength that we can find.”
