Apple Watch Took a Fall

If anyone wonders about the efficiency of an Apple watch being able to detect a fall and call emergency services, trust me this feature works. 

Even if you're not wearing the watch.

I know since last week my Apple watch called emergency services to report a hard fall.

How did that happen?

Before going to take a shower, I placed, perhaps tossed it and unbeknownst to me, it fell  behind a piece of bedroom furniture, which in turn triggered a call to emergency services.

Imagine my surprise after coming into the bedroom to hear a voice asking What is Your Emergency?

A dispatcher was asking my exact location, ready to send a paramedic unit to the mill apartments.

Unaware that the watch had fallen, I was somewhat confused. The Apple watch is designed to detect sudden, high-impact hard falls and while I've accidentally bumped it many times, it's never called emergency services. Calling on its own was a definite first.

Normally, If you're wearing  watch and it detects a hard fall, it taps your wrist, sounds an alarm and displays an alert. Then, depending on the situation, you can contact emergency services or dismiss the alert by tapping Close in the upper-left corner or tapping I'm OK. But, if the watch detects that you've been immobile for about 60 seconds, it will automatically call emergency services without any intervention on your part.

That's exactly what happened when my watch fell.

Calling emergency services is never to be taken lightly. After I told the dispatcher what had happened and apologized, the call was cancelled — not a moment too soon as the dispatcher was already contacting an emergency response unit.

Admittedly, this wasn't the first time, I'd activated Fall Detection. Months ago when on a step stool, I misjudged the last step, stepping down hard without a fall. Another time, I tripped on a curb and fell backward onto grass (Patrick was with me with no resulting injury).  Both times, the watch activated the feature, luckily was able to cancel in time.

If you own or are considering an Apple watch or other wearable device, there's many articles and videos about this features and others available online.

For those of us who are 55 or older, Fall Detection is turned on automatically when your age is entered in the iPhone's Health app. Those younger than 55 need to set up this feature.

Here's a few Fall Detection features on the Apple watch:

Fall Detection is exclusively an Apple Watch feature — not an iPhone feature and works whether your Apple watch (and connected iPhone) is locked or unlocked. You set it up on the iPhone Watch app.

Wrist detection must be active — the watch won't automatically call emergency services if it's disabled. To verify, go to Settings, select Passcode then make sure that it's turned on. 

Falls are automatically recorded in the Health app — unless you reply that you didn't fall when prompted by the watch. You can check your fall history, just open the Health app on your iPhone, tap Browse, tap Other Data, then tap Number of Times Fallen.

If you’re unresponsive after a hard fall — when the watch detects you’re immobile for a minute, it begins a 30-second countdown, tapping your wrist and sounding an alert. The alert gets louder, so that you or someone nearby can hear it. The watch will automatically contact emergency services with your location. If you don’t want to call emergency services, tap Cancel.

If you have emergency contacts set up — the watch sends a message to your emergency contacts telling them your location, that your watch detected a hard fall and contacted emergency services. If you use Emergency SOS, your emergency contacts won’t be automatically notified if the Messages app isn’t the selected text messaging app or is deleted. 

If the call has been made and you don't need emergency services — don't hang up. When a responder answers, explain that you don't need help. 

Why turn on Fall Detection?

For me, the answer is easy, it provides me with peace of mind. Accidents happen and I can take a fall anywhere as I walk a lot on the treadmill or outside, many times without Patrick or anyone else. I like knowing there's a way to call for help in a real emergency. 

Of course, there are many other wearables — watches and other medic alert devices with this and other safety features plus stories about how these have saved lives. This post is based only on my personal experience with wearing an Apple watch for several years. And, I also understand some folks prefer not to wear such devices, which is their choice.

Your turn — Do you wear an Apple watch or other device, if so, do you have a similar experience to share?