During a commercial roof inspection, a small UA stops responding to control inputs, flies off uncommanded, and crashes into a tree. The aircraft is destroyed. No one is hurt and no other property is damaged. What must the remote PIC do?

Why →A true fly-away is a flight control system malfunction, one of the serious incidents listed in 49 CFR § 830.5 that require immediate notification to the nearest NTSB office. The NTSB's advisory to drone operators confirms the § 830.5 list applies to every civil UAS regardless of size or airworthiness certification. The crash is not an accident under § 830.2 because no one was seriously injured and the aircraft holds no airworthiness certificate, and § 107.9 never triggers because there was no serious injury and no damage over $500 to property other than the drone. The NTSB incident notification stands on its own.

The trap →The nothing-to-report option borrows the injury and damage thresholds from § 107.9, but those belong to the FAA rule. The § 830.5 serious-incident list has no dollar floor and no injury requirement. The 10-day FAA report option grabs the familiar Part 107 rule, but a fly-away with no injury and no third-party damage is exactly the case where the NTSB duty applies and the FAA one does not.

Field note →The NTSB's own advisory uses this scenario almost word for word: fly-away, tree, drone destroyed, nobody hurt. Not an accident, but the operator must still notify the NTSB of the flight control malfunction. Its Response Operations Center takes these calls at 844-373-9922.