Apple Watch Fall Detection helps save 92-year-old farmer after fall
A 92-year-old retired Nebraska farmer is crediting the Apple Watch Fall Detection feature with saving his life after a 21-foot fall.
Credit: Apple
The Apple Watch that the man, Jim Salsman of Grant, Nebraska, was wearing automatically alerted emergency services after he took the plunge about a month ago.
Salsman had been climbing the ladder to secure a grain bin from pigeons. Once he was on it, the wind had pushed and sent him falling 21 feet the ground. "It was just a dumb stupid mistake on my part,' Salsman told local media outlet KETV.
After he hit the ground, Salsman said he was in a lot of pain. He activated "Hey Siri" on his Apple Watch, telling it that he was "hurt bad on the farm."
But by the time he activated the digital assistant, first responders from the Grant Volunteer Fire Department had already been alerted to the fall with details on his current location.
The retired farmer is still recovering from a broken hip and other injuries at the Madonna Rehabilitation Hospital in Lincoln. He said if it wasn't for his Apple Watch, he might not have been so lucky.
"If I didn't have this watch, I think I would've been dead before anybody missed me," Salsman said. "I really do."
This isn't the first time an Apple Watch user has credited the feature for helping to save them in an emergency. In 2019, Fall Detection summoned first responders after a Norwegian man took a midnight fall and fractured his skull. It also contacted 911 when a 87-year-old woman got into a car crash in June of that year.
The Apple Watch Fall Detection feature can automatically detect if a user takes a hard impact or fall. Once it does, it prompts the user to see if they're okay -- and automatically contacts emergency services if they don't respond within a minute.
First introduced on the Apple Watch Series 4, Fall Detection is enabled by default for wearers 65 years and older. Everyone else has to manually turn it on.
Credit: Apple
The Apple Watch that the man, Jim Salsman of Grant, Nebraska, was wearing automatically alerted emergency services after he took the plunge about a month ago.
Salsman had been climbing the ladder to secure a grain bin from pigeons. Once he was on it, the wind had pushed and sent him falling 21 feet the ground. "It was just a dumb stupid mistake on my part,' Salsman told local media outlet KETV.
After he hit the ground, Salsman said he was in a lot of pain. He activated "Hey Siri" on his Apple Watch, telling it that he was "hurt bad on the farm."
But by the time he activated the digital assistant, first responders from the Grant Volunteer Fire Department had already been alerted to the fall with details on his current location.
The retired farmer is still recovering from a broken hip and other injuries at the Madonna Rehabilitation Hospital in Lincoln. He said if it wasn't for his Apple Watch, he might not have been so lucky.
"If I didn't have this watch, I think I would've been dead before anybody missed me," Salsman said. "I really do."
This isn't the first time an Apple Watch user has credited the feature for helping to save them in an emergency. In 2019, Fall Detection summoned first responders after a Norwegian man took a midnight fall and fractured his skull. It also contacted 911 when a 87-year-old woman got into a car crash in June of that year.
The Apple Watch Fall Detection feature can automatically detect if a user takes a hard impact or fall. Once it does, it prompts the user to see if they're okay -- and automatically contacts emergency services if they don't respond within a minute.
First introduced on the Apple Watch Series 4, Fall Detection is enabled by default for wearers 65 years and older. Everyone else has to manually turn it on.
Comments
The cost of an Apple watch is peanuts compared to what it provides. Just one visit to the doctor can easily cost more than an Apple watch.
I look forward to seeing what new medical and health features Apple will be putting in future versions. It'll only become more of an essential item.
I guess that it's up to those who are more tech savvy to set up the devices for the older people in their family and show them how to use it with the least amount of hassle/effort.
I wouldn't mind a few more detectors (blood sugar, heart attack, "general dying"), but I already feel like my AW is pushing the survival-rate odds a bit more in my favour.
And then there's all the health data it collects, that it allows me to stay connect without having to carry my phone all the time, that I get select notifications, straight from the watch can archive less important emails; and so on.
Those are the typical excuses.... Bullshit.... But, as we see everyday in national news, bullshit works when one wants it to work.
They need something that will detect the CoronaVirus.
There's more to technology than the Apple Watch. And, seniors tend to be very active in it. Yeh, there are those still using flip-phones but not many -- and the same could be said for the younger set as well.
The watch is probably detecting a downward movement finishing with a sudden arrest of motion.
When you lift heavy objects into the car, you're probably slamming down the item quite hard, rather than slowly placing it, which is why the watch thinks you've fallen.
When you fell over your cat, you probably didn't fall quickly, as you struck the coffee table first, then probably crumpled to the floor, rather than slamming straight into it as demonstrated here:
You probably needed to fall faster.
Or better yet, switch on the light.
I'm also not allowed to moonwalk in the living room following the 'heirloom incident'.