 In 1959, the Chief of the Air Staff, Air Marshal Sir Frederick Scherger, proposed building a second airfield in the Darwin area.Like Tindal, he had been in Darwin when it was bombed by the Japanese in 1942, and believed that Australia's defences in the north needed to be strengthened.Following a survey, Tindal was selected in May 1963 as being close enough to RAAF Base Darwin to afford mutual protection, but far enough from the coast to be defensible and to avoid the effects of tropical cyclones.