These are images that are difficult to bear: The photo reporter Lynsey Addario from the "New York Times" captured with her camera how a Ukrainian family was killed by Russian shells while fleeing across the Irpin River to Kyiv.

Equipped with rucksacks and a blue and a gray trolley case, the mother was trying to get to safety across the street with her two children when they were hit by the grenades.

Addario was twenty yards away behind a concrete wall when the shells went off.

"When our security guy said we could run across the street now, I ran and saw this family on the ground," Addario reported on Times Radio.

“I saw these little boots and down jackets and of course I thought about my own children.

And I thought it's disrespectful to take a picture, but I have to take a picture of this.

This is a war crime.” Her colleague, freelance journalist Andriy Dubchak, filmed the events.

They had postponed the escape

The New York Times published Addario's photo of the dead across five columns on its front page.

The victims' father and husband, Serhiy Perebyinis, who was already in Poland, spotted it on Twitter and recognized the dead: Tetiana Perebyinis, 43, and their children Mykyta, 18, and Alysa, 9. Also a helper, Anatoly Berezhny, 26, who had previously evacuated his own family but returned to help others, died.

Tetiana was supposed to come to Poland with the children, but had postponed her departure out of concern for her mother, who had Alzheimer's.

As Serhiy Prebyinis and Polina Nevad, a godmother, told The New York Times, Mykyta had stayed up at night to stand guard and make sure the family slept in the hallway, away from windows and outside walls.

When a bullet hit her house

they fled to the basement.

The family put off a first attempt to escape after two days in the basement last Saturday in their own minivan when they spotted a tank in the street.

It wasn't until the following morning that they set out with a plan that Tetiana had discussed with her husband.

They drove as far as they could and then tried to get to Kyiv on foot across a badly damaged bridge.

There they were hit by the mortar shells.

Meanwhile, Serhiy Perebyinis tried to call his wife and children but was unable to get through.

Shortly thereafter, he saw the picture on Twitter.

"I recognized the luggage and then I knew what had happened." His parents, who were behind Tetiana and the children, were unharmed.

Lynsey Addario, who has been documenting events since the start of the invasion of Ukraine by Putin's forces, said the attackers fired further away at first, but then "aimed closer and closer to where civilians were."

The world needs to see their pictures to be aware of the war crimes committed by the Russian army, Addario said.

"We have to report this," she said.

"Civilians are being deliberately shot at."