Of all the new products I’ve reviewed across 15 years of writing for AppleInsider, Apple Watch has certainly has made the most impact to me personally. A couple weeks ago it literally saved my life.
Of all the new products I’ve reviewed across 15 years of writing for AppleInsider, Apple Watch has certainly has made the most impact to me personally. A couple weeks ago it literally saved my life.
I’m not the first person to be saved by paramedics alerted by an emergency call initiated by Crash Detection. There have also been complaints of emergency workers inconvenienced by false alert calls related to events including roller coasters, where the user didn’t cancel the emergency call in time.
But I literally have some skin in the game with this new feature because Crash Detection called in an emergency response for me as I was unconscious and bleeding on the sidewalk, alone and late at night. According to calls it made, I was picked up and on my way to an emergency room within half an hour.
Because my accident occurred in a potentially dangerous and somewhat secluded area, I would likely have bled to death if the call hadn’t been automatically placed.
Not just for car crashes
Apple created the feature to watch for evidence of a „severe car crash,“ using data from its devices‘ gyroscopes and accelerometers, along with other sensors and analysis that determines that a crash has occured and that a vehicle operator might be disabled or unable to call for help themselves.
In my case, there was no car involved. Instead, I had checked out a rental scooter intending to make a quick trip back to where I’d parked my car.
But after just a couple blocks, my trip was sidelined by a crash. I was knocked unconscious on the side of a bridge crossing over a freeway.
A deep gash above my eye was bleeding heavily. I began losing a lot of blood.
I didn’t regain consciousness for another five hours, leaving me at the mercy of my technology and the health workers Crash Detection was able to contact on my behalf.
Crash Detection working as intended
Even though I wasn’t driving a conventional vehicle, Crash Detection determined that I had been involved in a serious accident and that I wasn’t responding. Within 20 seconds, it called emergency services with my location. Within thirty minutes I was loaded in an ambulance and on the way to the emergency room.
When I came to, I had to ask what was happening. That’s the first I found out that I was getting my eyebrow stitched up and had various scrapes across the half of my face that I had apparently used to a break my fall.
