Part 107 Emergency Procedures: Lost Link, In-Flight Emergencies, and 14 CFR 107.21

Emergency procedures on the Part 107 knowledge test sit inside Task Area 5, Operations, which already covers lost-link behavior at a high level. Candidates searching specifically for “Part 107 emergency procedures” are usually after the regulatory detail behind that overview, most importantly 14 CFR 107.21, the emergency deviation rule the ACS (Airman Certification Standards) leans on hardest in scenario questions. This guide covers that rule directly, plus the accident-reporting obligation that follows an emergency.

14 CFR 107.21: the emergency deviation rule

The regulation that governs an actual in-flight emergency is 14 CFR 107.21. In an in-flight emergency requiring immediate action, the remote pilot in command (RPIC) may deviate from any rule in Part 107 to the extent necessary to meet that emergency. This is a broad, deliberately open grant of authority: the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) is not asking a pilot to look up which specific rule they are allowed to break mid-emergency, it is telling them that safety comes first and the paperwork comes after. The RPIC must, upon request of the FAA, send a written report of the deviation to the FAA. The test typically frames this as a scenario: something goes wrong, the pilot does something that would normally violate a Part 107 rule (flying above 400 feet, operating outside the authorized airspace, exceeding a waiver condition) specifically to resolve the emergency safely, and the question asks whether that was permitted. Under 107.21, it was, provided the deviation was actually necessary to meet the emergency and not just convenient.

Lost link: what “programmed to respond” actually means

A lost control link is the most common emergency scenario the test poses: the connection between the controller and the aircraft is interrupted. Most modern small unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) have a programmed lost-link behavior, most often returning to a home point or landing in place, that activates automatically without pilot input. The concept the test checks hardest here is responsibility, not mechanics: the RPIC remains responsible for the aircraft’s actions during a lost-link event even though they have no direct input at that moment the aircraft is executing its programmed response. “The aircraft is flying itself” is never a correct answer to “who is responsible right now.” A remote pilot who has not checked what their specific aircraft’s lost-link behavior is set to before flying is not prepared for this scenario in the way the ACS expects.

Fly-aways and loss of positive control

A fly-away, where the aircraft does not respond to control inputs or its programmed lost-link behavior and continues moving unpredictably, is treated as a more serious version of the same emergency: the RPIC’s obligations under 107.21 still apply (do whatever is necessary to protect people and property), and the incident is far more likely to trigger the accident-reporting threshold below. Preflight steps that reduce fly-away risk, checking firmware status, control- link health, and battery condition, live in Task Area 10, Maintenance and Preflight Inspection Procedures, the companion task area to this one: a good preflight check is what keeps an emergency-procedures scenario from happening in the first place.

After the emergency: accident reporting under 107.9

An emergency that results in injury or damage does not end when the aircraft is back on the ground. 14 CFR 107.9 requires an RPIC to report an accident to the FAA within 10 days if it results in serious injury to any person, or loss of consciousness, or damage to any property other than the small unmanned aircraft, where the cost of repair (including materials and labor) or fair-market value in the case of total loss exceeds $500. This threshold is deliberately low and property-damage focused, not just injury focused, so do not assume a rough landing that scuffs a fence is exempt just because nobody was hurt. The report goes to the FAA, not to a manufacturer or an insurer, and it is a regulatory obligation independent of anything else that happens after an incident.

How this gets tested

Expect a scenario that describes something going wrong mid-flight (a lost link, a system warning, an unexpected obstacle) and asks what the RPIC is permitted or required to do, whether a described deviation from a normal rule was justified, or whether a described outcome meets the accident-reporting threshold. The 107.21 emergency-deviation questions and the 107.9 accident-reporting questions are the two patterns that repeat most; know both rule numbers, not just the general idea behind them. Run mixed Operations scenarios in the free practice bank to build the pattern recognition this task area actually tests.