Apple Watch’s fall detection feature saves hiker after near-fatal fall

Apple Watch’s fall detection feature has saved many lives time and again. Recently, it saved a man from Georgia when he fell while on a hiking trip to the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area earlier this year with his two dogs. The man had to undergo surgery and get titanium rods in his legs, however, he survived, thanks to the fall detection feature that dialed 911 in time.

Mike Menand and two of his dogs were on a hiking trip to the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area. Menand suffered a near-fatal fall after his dogs spotted a coyote in the distance which spooked them. The dogs knocked Menand down and dragged him off the trail leaving him in immense pain so much so that he couldn’t get the phone out of his pocket.

Luckily, Apple Watch’s fall detection feature came into action triggering an automatic alert to 911 regarding the fatal fall. The feature has saved many lives over the years and has gotten better with every iteration.

The fall detection feature is available on the Apple Watch SE, Apple Watch Ultra and later, and Apple Watch Series 4 or later. The feature is designed to trigger whenever he senses that the wearer has fallen. He sends out a visual and audio cue before dialing 911 so that the users can tap on “I’m OK” on the screen or press the Digital Crown to disable the false alarm.

If the user fails to press the prompt on the screen within a minute, Apple Watch dials the emergency services with the details about the wearer, age, and location among other information that they can use to track the users.

Menand was fortunate enough to survive a near-fatal fall as a titanium rod was inserted to fix his broken fall. A woman named Sandy Springs (aged 46 years) fell to death in the same park which gives Menand goosebumps as he was in the same park all by himself if not for Apple Watch.

You can enable the fall detection feature on Apple Watch via Settings >> My Watch >> Emergency SOS >> turn on ‘Fall Detection’. If you are above 55 years of age, the feature will be automatically enabled.

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