Lowood Operations Building, underground bunker at at Moutn Tarampa, near Lowood Airfield, Queensland

LOWOOD OPERATIONS BUILDING
UNDERGROUND BUNKER,
AT MOUNT TARAMPA, QLD
NEAR LOWOOD AIRFIELD

The Commonwealth Government acquired land on 13 May 1943 near the Lowood airfield, in Queensland to build an underground Operations Building. The following is part of a document showing the status of semi-underground buildings by November 1943:-

COPY ONLY

Original on 171 56/1

this copy for 171/1/1493

UTILIZATION OF SEMI-UNDERGROUND BUILDINGS

D.A.S.P.

Herewith is list of above buildings as requested in your minute dated 29th November, 1943.

signed W/Crd.
Richmond.
for G/Capt.
D.W.B.

2/12/43

(c) UNDER CONSTRUCTION INDICATING ???? OF CONSTRUCTION

Building Details

Drawing No.

Locality Plan

Drawing No.

LOWOOD, Q'LAND.

Operations Building - 95% complete

Transmitting Building

42/43/1571

41/42/2682

(R.S. 1072
(40/41/1556
(
R.S. 1072
(40/41/1556

COMPLETED AND IN USE
Coffs Harbour, NSW
Mallacoota, VIC
Moruya, NSW

COMPLETED BUT NOT IN USE
Albany, WA

UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Camden, NSW
Pearce, WA

Can anyone tell me if any of these bunkers are still in existance?

The remains of the partly underground Operations Room near Lowood can still be seen on the northern slopes of nearby Mount Tarampa on a property near the corner of Mullers Road and Kavanagh Road. The impressive Operations Building bunker is located on a 1.3ha at Lot 4, Mullers Road, Mount Tarampa. In 2004 it was still owned by Ray Argow of Caloundra. Ray had purchased the property and a larger adjacent 121 ha dairy farm in 1993. He sold the dairy farm in about 2000.

There are many stories about tunnels that started under Mount Tarampa possibly leading to Amberley airfield. There are also stories of Negro military personnel being buried alive when the underground tunnel was destroyed at the end of the war. There are also stories of 3 Spitfires, still in their original crates, being buried near this Operations Building. They are all totally unsubstantiated rumours. The owner, Ray Argow once did some digging to find the rumoured tunnels. Using a bulldozer he went down about 10 metres and found no evidence at all of such an entrance.

The Lowood Underground Operations Room. Photo taken on 31 December 2000
The bunker is very long with a semi-circular roof still partly buried.
Photo taken looking towards the old Lowood airfield

The above photo is about 2 pages wide - please cursor to the right to see the full width of the bunker ---->>

Lowood Underground Operations Building Site
Lowood Aerodrome

Warning - 188 Kbytes

Lowood Underground Operation Building Site
Lowood Aerodrome

Warning - 83 Kbytes

On 31 December 2000 I visited the Lowood bunker and took the colour photos you can see on this page. I'd like to thank Bruce & Robyn Willey and Robyn's father, who owns the property, for their permission to take the photos.

The Lowood Transmitting Building which operated in conjunction with this Operations Building is another slightly smaller bunker located behind the Tarampa Baptist Cemetery on the way back towards Lowood.