Fall detection on the Apple Watch helps hiker survive a serious injury

Fall detection on the Apple Watch helps hiker survive a serious injury،

The Apple Watch has many life-saving features and the one that was used to help Mike Menand survive a serious injury was the fall detection feature. Menand was hiking in the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area with her two dogs when the dogs spotted a coyote in the distance. “They got scared, and they knocked me down and dragged me off the trail,” Menand said, explaining the action that activated the fall detection on his watch.

Once Apple Watch detects a fall (it’s available on Apple Watch SE, Apple Watch Series 4 or later, or Apple Watch Ultra or later), it will tap the user’s wrist , will sound an alarm and display an alert on the screen. screen; The user can stop the alarm by pressing the digital crown, tapping Close in the upper left corner, or tapping “I’m fine”. However, if the Apple Watch detects no movement for about a minute, it will automatically call emergency services.

Menand was seriously imaged by the fall. “I couldn’t even get to the phone because my phone was in my pocket, which I was lying on,” the hiker said. “There’s no telling how long I would have been there,” he said. “I realized I couldn’t move, I couldn’t get up. I was in a lot of pain. Once the 911 call was made, they stayed with me until the emergency services arrived .” He had to have a titanium rod put in his leg and is sticking to paved roads for now while he recovers.

Menand realized how lucky he was to have his Apple Watch with him that day because shortly after his fall, a 46-year-old Sandy Springs woman and her two dogs fell in the same park. She didn’t survive. “When I read that,” he said, “I thought it could have been me. Because I was alone, no one around me, no one really knew where I was.”

After the incident, the hiker wrote a thank you note to Apple CEO Tim Cook, and Apple spoke with Fox 5 in Roswell to help share the story.

If you entered your age on your Apple Watch or in the Health app and you are 55 or older, the fall detection feature will be turned on by default. You can also activate it yourself if you are between 18 and 54 years old by going to Settings on your Apple Watch > My watch > Emergency SOS and turn on Fall detection.