Apple’s Crash Detection feature keeps calling 911 after it mistakenly identifies a roller coaster ride as a severe car crash. This clearly shows that the developer team who created the feature did not program it to identify if the owner was riding a rollercoaster or driving a car.
As per The Wall Street Journal, since the release of the newest iPhone, there have been multiple reports where an iPhone 14 has contacted the emergency hotline during a roller coaster ride and sent a message that “The owner of this iPhone was in a severe car crash and is not responding to their phone.”
In a Twitter post, Joana Stern, WSJ Executive Video Editor, showed how the feature contacted 911 during a roller coaster ride:
The 911 call was made by an iPhone 14 Pro from Kings Island amusement park outside of Cincinnati. The Warren County Communications Center responded quickly and dispatched a crew to the suspected “accident scene,” however there was no emergency.
Apple is likely to provide an update to this feature soon to address these sorts of instances. If you want to ride a roller coaster and own an iPhone 14, you can temporarily disable the feature by switching to Airplane Mode or going to Settings-> Emergency SOS-> Call After Severe Crash and turning it off. Just make sure to remember to re-enable it afterward.
The Crash Detection function is extremely useful during car accidents and can save many lives. However, Apple’s testing team may not have considered testing it at theme parks, specifically while riding a roller coaster.
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