Construction of the two prototypes was well advanced when Germany invaded France on 10 May 1940, and in late May the nearly complete prototypes were evacuated from Villacoublay near Paris, with the first prototype being sent to Bône in Algeria and the second to the Bréguet factory at Anglet, near Bayonne in the far south-west of France. The first prototype was destroyed in Algeria during a German air raid following the Allied invasion of French North Africa, but the second prototype remained untouched, despite the fact that Anglet was occupied by the Germans from 1940.