[1] The former Operations and Signals Bunker (3FSHQ) was constructed between 1942 and 1944 for No 3 Fighter Sector Headquarters of the Royal Australian Air Force.

[1] The increase in Japanese military activity in Asia in the late 1930s led the Australian Government to establish air bases in the north of Australia.

The Department of Defence began negotiations with the Townsville City Council to transfer the Garbutt aerodrome to the Australian Government in early 1939.

Faced with the threat of invasion the Australian and American Governments began to develop a major military base in the Townsville Region.

The role of high frequency directional radio stations was to assist fighter pilots to get their bearings during airborne patrols.

The new complex was constructed on the lower, eastern slopes of Mount Stuart on 68 acres (28 ha) of land requisitioned by the Australian Government in August 1942.

The site was regarded as ideal as it was some distance from the main airfields and the public eye, but still close enough to the various other installations it liaised with.

However, by November 1943 the bunker, identified as a semi-underground building because all cabling was laid underground, was not yet occupied because associated accommodation facilities had not been completed.

The delay related to the fact that the complex was located some distance from the airfield and there was some question as to whether the facility could provide briefing to air crews in an adequate time frame.

On 25 January 1945 the Royal Australian Airforce established their Air Defence Headquarters in the Stuart complex; from where they operated until 1947.

Additional huts were placed on the site to provide more accommodation for migrants who arrived in large numbers after the war.

[1] In 1961 James Cook University of North Queensland purchased the site for student accommodation while the residential halls at Douglas were under construction.

The site is set back from Stuart Drive, which becomes the highway west to Charters Towers, and is about ten kilometres south-west of Townsville's city centre.

Surrounding the bunker are remnants and material scatter from other structures of the complex, which have the potential to yield further information which will contribute to the understanding of the site.

The former Operations and Signals Bunker During has special association for the numbers of European migrants who were accommodated in the complex after WWII, many of whom have remained in North Queensland.