The driver was found at the bottom of a ravine, bleeding, but survived the incident
A man's life was saved by technology after he accidentally drove off a cliff in the Mount Wilson area, plunging nearly 400 feet. The driver was found at the bottom of a ravine, bleeding, but survived the incident, according to police.
LA County Sheriff's Department told ABC News that they were able to save the man after they received an alarm triggered by his phone.
"The majority of calls we get there over the sides usually are fatal," Mike Leum, a search and rescue group leader for the LA County Sheriff's Department told ABC News about the crash site, which was off a windy road along Mount Wilson.
The volunteer search and rescue responders first received a report about the crash around 11 pm on Friday. Mr Leum told ABC News that the dispatchers learned about the incident due to the driver's iPhone 14 crash detection program. Recent iPhones and Apple Watches have a program that automatically alerts authorities if the phone's sensors suggest the device's owner might be in a crash or hard fall.
"We're talking about hundreds of miles of mountain roads where these people could have gone over the side," Mr Leum said about the incident on Friday and other similar incidents involving the crash detection program. "So I'm not convinced that they would have ever been found."
iPhone 14 used a feature that instantly reports a crash to 911 via satellite. The phone uses GPS positioning. In this case, the phone reported the coordinates of where the car ended up after veering off the road.
An operator at the communication centre called the nearest law enforcement agency.
On arrival, the police department was able to hear a man yelling and rescuers were able to locate the vehicle approximately 400 feet below the road, CBS News reported.
Apple's Emergency SOS via Satellite and Crash Detection feature was introduced in September 2022.