Sparta Aviation Service Cessna 402B incident

The airplane struck airport lighting during an aborted takeoff. The pilot said, "I followed the taxi line until I found a white line and lined up on it. I applied partial power, ...when I noticed what I thought was a box on the runway (all I could discern was a black cube)." He said, "...I heard a WHUMP, but felt no yaw or any adverse affect on the airplane." He "...heard what seemed like a buzz." He aborted the takeoff, taxied to the parking ramp, and found propeller damage. A runway inspection revealed a damaged directional sign and runway light on runway 31C's northeast shoulder prior to the runway's displaced threshold. An investigation revealed that near the foxtrot taxiway on runway 31C two taxiway centerline markings branched out from and were located north of the taxiway's lead-in line for runway 31C's centerline. These two taxiway centerline markings were located on the runway's approach side of the displaced threshold bar for runway 31C and these taxiway centerline markings did cross the solid white northeast runway side stripe for runway 31C. Runway 31C's shoulder, at the incident site, was found without shoulder markings. Advisory Circular 150/5340-1H states, "Runway shoulder markings are used ... where pilots have experienced problems identifying the runway from the shoulder thereby creating a need to delineate the shoulder as unusable pavement."

Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset