Thanks to the iPhone’s Accident Detection feature, the 21-year-old was able to be quickly taken care of by emergency services.
Heart problem, lost in the forest… the iPhone and Apple Watch have several functions that can save the life of their owner. On the night of September 7 to 8, in Beaumont-sur-Lèze, one of them allowed a young man who was the victim of an accident to be quickly taken care of by emergency services.
Called “Accident Detection,” it lets your device contact emergency services if it detects a serious car accident. Available on iPhone 14 and Apple Watch Series 8, it alerted emergency services after a 21-year-old man crashed into a plane tree and was knocked unconscious.
The importance of rapid care
By calling for help while he was unconscious, his iPhone allowed the victim to gain valuable time, if not vital for his care. Indeed, there are often no witnesses when a person leaves the road at night or in a somewhat remote area, as Vincent Bounes, head of the SAMU 31 service, explained to BFMTV.
In other words, the person who is the victim of an accident is discovered in the morning most of the time, which is problematic because “we can have irreversible injuries linked to very long treatment,” Vincent Bounes stressed.
Using sensors built into the device, the “Accident Detection” feature is enabled by default on the iPhone and Apple Watch. The device’s GPS position then allowed emergency services to locate the accident. While this feature is only available on some Apple devices, a similar system, called e-call, has been installed directly in new cars sold in the European Union since 2018.
