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A man survived a hard fall from his bike after his Apple watch alerted his family and emergency services of the accident.
Gabe Burdett and his father Bob were supposed to go mountain biking together. While waiting at the designated meeting place, Gabe received an alert from his father’s Apple watch, saying that the old man had suffered a hard fall. The message included a map to his father’s location.
While riding en route to the meeting place, Bob had indeed fallen from his bike and passed out. His smartwatch then called and sent his location to emergency services. Help had arrived before his son could catch him. After a while, his son received another message from the watch updating Bob’s location, which was now at the hospital.
The latest Apple watches are equipped with a safety feature that detects hard falls. When a hard fall is detected, the watch taps the wearer’s wrist and displays an alert. The wearer can opt to dismiss this notification or order the watch to contact emergency services.
However, if the wearer is immobile 60 seconds after a hard fall, the watch begins a 30-second countdown while continuously tapping the wearer and producing a loud noise. After the countdown, the watch calls emergency services and sends a message to the wearer’s emergency contacts.
Gabe posted this story on Facebook and encouraged people to use their Apple watches’ emergency feature as it can potentially save them from peril.
The feature is automatically turned on for users over 65 years old, but it needs to be turned on manually for younger users.