I AM always tickled when I think of the day Chris Bennett’s dream came true.

He had spent nearly a decade and a half trying to convince Westminster City Council to close a very busy part of Buckingham Palace Road because he felt sure that the remains of a Hurricane fighter plane was hidden under the tarmac.

And in 2004 the photographer and writer was proven right – when he was given 24 hours to investigate what lay beneath the street. The story was captured on Channel 5’s Fighter Dig Live.

The plane’s pilot, Sergeant Ray Holmes, was considered a hero for stopping an enemy aircraft zooming towards the palace – a plot to kill the royal family? – and lived just long enough to see the debris of his own plane uncovered. He died the year after the engine was pulled up by the archaeologists. Rightly, a lot has been said about Ray – he was a genuine hero of the Second World War and a man who they still toast in Pimlico.

But we should also remember Mr Bennett, whose work could be a dictionary definition of “dogged reporter”.

He was once interviewed in the newspapers under the headline “plane crazy” – but his amazing story had been perfectly researched.

The Hurricane was lifted up, and went on display at the Imperial War Museum.