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ORIGINAL: loki100

In January 1943, Jean de Selys Longchamps, a Belgian RAF pilot, switched off his radio, left his squadron over Ghent and turned his plane toward Brussels. He attacked the Gestapo HQ, dropped a Belgian flag and made it back to England. He was both demoted and decorated for this.

He had evaded air defence by flying low and used the line of the Avenue Émile De Mot to guide him to the building on Avenue Louise. He then fired his plane's canon, killing a number of Gestapo officers inside. Locals would keep walking past the building later, much to the Nazi's annoyance.

De Selys Longchamps was 30 at the time and was killed just a few months later when his plane crashed on landing after a sortie over Ostend. He had been at Dunkirk, returned to France, was captured and interned by the Vichy authorities, escaped to the UK again and joined the RAF.