According to English Wikipedia, construction at Shek Kong began in 1938, when Japan’s advance in southern China made Hong Kong’s defence urgent. Hong Kong fell in December 1941 and the work was interrupted until the end of the occupation in 1945. The field opened in 1950 as RAF Sek Kong, one of the stations of British Forces Overseas Hong Kong.

Its first fighters came in a tense year: the Chinese Civil War was being decided across the border, and the RAF had reinforced the colony in 1949. No. 80 Squadron, which had arrived in July 1949, is listed at Sek Kong from January to April 1950 with Spitfire F.24s, and No. 28 Squadron moved between Kai Tak and Sek Kong with Spitfires and then Vampires. No. 80 Squadron’s Wikipedia history says its main duty was to defend Hong Kong from a perceived Communist threat.

The fighter era at Sek Kong was short. After the 1957 Defence Review the airfield was handed to the Army in June 1957, and No. 28 Squadron went back to Kai Tak, where it flew Hunters until it disbanded in January 1967.

Aviation returned in 1978. On 17 May that year No. 28 Squadron, re-formed as a helicopter unit with Westland Wessex, moved to Sek Kong, and No. 660 Squadron of the Army Air Corps was re-formed there with Westland Scouts. The Army squadron’s tasks, according to its Wikipedia history, were observation, troop lift on the border with the People’s Republic, and anti-smuggling and immigration control; it was heavily involved in stopping illegal immigrants crossing from the mainland.

No. 660 Squadron disbanded in 1994 in the run-up to the handover. No. 28 Squadron left Sek Kong on 1 November 1996, returned to Kai Tak and disbanded there on 3 June 1997, four weeks before the handover; its Wessex helicopters were sold to Uruguay, and it was the last RAF squadron to leave the territory.

Hong Kong received tens of thousands of Vietnamese boat people after 1975; English Wikipedia gives a peak of 64,300 in October 1991. From June 1989 the Sek Kong runway was used as a holding centre, run by the Hong Kong Police. Half of the runway was closed and covered with tents and Quonset huts, and only helicopters could fly.

The numbers are uncertain. Wikipedia’s article on the Vietnamese in Hong Kong gives an estimated 7,000 and 4,400 in tents in 1990; the airfield article gives a peak of 9,000 in 1992, citing The New York Times. Local residents protested against the camp. The runway was restored in 1995, in time for the Hong Kong Aviation Club, which had moved most of its aircraft from Kai Tak in 1994 after general aviation hours there were cut to two a morning.

The PLA Hong Kong Garrison assumed responsibility for the defence of Hong Kong from midnight on 1 July 1997, and Shek Kong became its air base. English Wikipedia describes one helicopter squadron there, flying Harbin Z-9 utility helicopters since 1997, and says four helicopter landing zones were marked on the runway. The garrison publishes no aircraft count, and none is given here.

The club stayed. The PLA uses the airfield during the week and the Hong Kong Aviation Club, whose roots go back to the Hong Kong Flying Club of 1929, flies its light aircraft from it at weekends. Kai Tak closed to fixed-wing aircraft in 1998.

The base has shaped its surroundings for eight decades. English Wikipedia’s article on Shek Kong says the barracks and airfield occupy the largest area of the valley, flattening the landscape and re-channelling a tributary of the Kam Tin River. The British built family quarters on the slopes of Lui Kung Tin around 1957, and a sizeable Nepali Gurkha community still lives around Kam Tin and Pat Heung, long after the British garrison left.