A Gulfstream III corporate jet was damaged in a runway excursion accident during takeoff from London-Biggin Hill Airport (BQH). The crew of Gulfstream III N103CD planned for a private flight from Biggin Hill Airport to Gander International Airport in Canada. The weather reported at the airport at 2020 hrs was wind ‘calm’, greater than 10 km visibility with fog patches, no significant cloud, temperature 5øC, dew point 4øC and QNH 1027 hPa. At 20:24 hours, the crew was cleared to taxi to holding point J1 for a departure from runway 03. At 20:28, the aircraft was at the holding point and was cleared for takeoff by the controller. The aircraft taxied towards the runway from J1 but lined up with the runway edge lights, which were positioned 3 m to the right of the edge of the runway. The aircraft began its takeoff run at 20:30, passing over paved surface for approximately 248 m before running onto grass which lay beyond. The commander, who was the handling pilot, closed the thrust levers to reject the takeoff when he realised what had happened and the aircraft came to a halt on the grass having suffered major structural damage. The crew shut down the engines but were unable to contact ATC on the radio to tell the controller what had happened. The co-pilot moved from the flight deck into the passenger cabin and saw that no one had been injured. He vacated the aircraft through the rear baggage compartment and then helped the commander, who was still inside, to open the main exit door. The commander and the five passengers used the main exit to vacate the aircraft. Biggin Hill was originally a military airfield and at the beginning of runway 03 is a 250 m long and 36 m wide paved surface, with a 30ø slant to the runway, called an Operational Readiness Platform (ORP). While there are no markings at the start of the ORP to indicate that aircraft should not enter this area, a section of the ORP between the runway and taxiway C has been painted with yellow hatching. Grass and weeds have grown in the gaps between the concrete segments in the ORP. Four surface-mounted red runway edge lights, evenly spaced 61 m apart, were positioned approximately 3 m from the white line that marked the edge of the runway. The most northerly light was located 30 m from the threshold of runway 03. Beyond the lights marking the runway threshold, white runway edge lights were mounted on poles located in the grass.