In this scenario the formatting of the disk fails and then the disk just dissapears even in diskpart until next reboot.
Solution is to get the correct SATA driver for the device. This happened on one of the Surface Pro 3's yet all the others imaged fine. Using the driver provided by the driver pack in the boot wim the task sequence was able to successfully format the disk.
Text from the smsts.log:
Format failed (0x80070057) OSDDiskPart 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 864 (0x0360) CVolume::Format( sDrive.c_str(), (*iter)->getFilesystem(), (*iter)->getVolumeName().c_str(), 0, (*iter)->getIsQuickFormat() ? CVolume::foptQuick : 0, FormatProgressCallback, NULL), HRESULT=80070057 (e:\nts_sccm_release\sms\client\osdeployment\osddiskpart\main.cpp,1003) OSDDiskPart 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 864 (0x0360) Failed to format drive C: (0x80070057) OSDDiskPart 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 864 (0x0360) FormatPartitions(oDisk), HRESULT=80070057 (e:\nts_sccm_release\sms\client\osdeployment\osddiskpart\main.cpp,1279) OSDDiskPart 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 864 (0x0360) Failed to format partition(s) for disk 0 (0x80070057) OSDDiskPart 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 864 (0x0360) OSDDiskPart.exe failed: 0x80070057 OSDDiskPart 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 864 (0x0360) Process completed with exit code 2147942487 TSManager 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 1088 (0x0440) !--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------! TSManager 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 1088 (0x0440) Failed to run the action: Format and Partition Disk (UEFI). This is usually caused by a problem with the program. Please check the Microsoft Knowledge Base to determine if this is a known issue or contact Microsoft Support Services for further assistance. The parameter is incorrect. (Error: 80070057; Source: Windows) TSManager 15/12/2014 4:33:23 PM 1088 (0x0440)