Man credits Apple Watch for saving his life after accident left him looking like a "monster"

No, no, no. Fall detection on the Apple Watch does not notify you when the calendar turns to the fall season. What fall detection does is detect when someone wearing an Apple Watch Series 4 or later, or an Apple Watch Ultra or later, takes a hard fall to the floor. If that happens, and the Apple Watch detects that you're moving, the watch will tap you on the wrist, sound an alarm, and display an alert. You then have the option to contact emergency services or to dismiss the alarm.

If you can't move for about a minute after the fall is detected, the Apple Watch will automatically call emergency services and contact your emergency contacts. The latter will be told your location and explain that your watch has detected a hard fall.

According to The New York Post, a man credits the Apple Watch for saving his life after an accident riding a Citi Bike left him looking like a "monster." The incident took place a month ago when real estate broker Eric Zollinger rode the bicycle into an 8-inch deep pothole; because the pothole was filled with rainwater, Zollinger couldn't see it. He explains what happened next.

"We had had a massive storm so the pothole was completely flooded. All of a sudden I looked up, and it’s all flooded and there was traffic behind me. I had to ride through it," Zellinger said. But when the bike hit the pothole, he flew off the bike and hit the pavement. The real estate broker stated, "I get up and the first thing I check is if my teeth are okay because I had veneers fitted a few years ago. Luckily they were okay. I hit my right knee and hit my face between my eyes and nose and hit my lip into my teeth, but I couldn’t see much blood."

But things got worse when the injured New Yorker walked the bike home and in the bathroom of his apartment, he self-diagnosed himself with a broken nose. When he went to take a shower, blood started gushing out of his nose leaving his bathroom looking like "a murder scene." Zellinger got dizzy and passed out smacking his head on the side of the tub which left him unconscious. More importantly, it set off the fall detector feature on the Apple Watch.

When he came to, Zellinger could hear a 911 operator talking to him through his Apple Watch. "The next thing I remember hearing is, ‘911, what’s your emergency," he said. Even though he canceled the emergency call and went to a local hospital where he was checked out and sent home, the New Yorker still credits the Apple Watch with saving his life. "I don’t know how things would have gone for me if the watch hadn’t alerted me," he noted.

After staying inside for three days because he was self-conscious about his appearance, Zellinger's bruises disappeared in a couple of weeks while his swelling took a little longer to go down. He praises Apple and the Apple Watch whenever recounting the incident. "I feel very fortunate and grateful at what transpired and happened in how my Apple Watch helped me. It’s very clever of the watch. Apple thinks of everything."

This isn't the first time that the fall detector on the Apple Watch performed heroics. For example, last May a woman on a business trip collapsed on a hotel room floor suffering from a ruptured aorta which is usually fatal. But thanks to the fall detection feature on the woman's Apple Watch, emergency help was summoned in time to save her life.