A woman who was involved in a horrific accident – on the same day as the tragic car crash in Cardiff – has shared a potentially life-saving tip for iPhone users after her phone automatically sent an SOS alert to her mother following her accident.
Pleasing on Twitter users to “list someone as an emergency contact,” Nicole Samuel shared a screenshot of a text her mother received detailing her location.
Police arrived at the scene to find Miss Samuel’s car flipped onto the roof, but she had made her way to safety.
Three days later, Miss Samuel tweeted: “It could be the difference between life and death. Please please please stop what you are doing and add a family member [as an emergency contact on your phone]’.
Miss Samuel’s accident in Aberdare, Wales, happened on Saturday March 4 – the same day a car carrying five friends crashed in Cardiff less than 25 miles away.
Darcy Ross, 21, Eve Smith, 21, and Rafel Jeanne, 24, died after their VW Tiguan swerved off the A48 and crashed into trees in the early hours of March 4.
Two friends, Sophie Russon, 20, and Shane Loughlin, 32, were in critical condition when they were found in the rubble.
Search parties had been scouring the area for nearly 48 hours after the five friends were last seen at a Cardiff petrol station at 2am on Saturday March 4.
Nicole Samuel was involved in a car crash on the main road through Llwydcoed, South Wales on Saturday March 4th. She then wrote some advice that everyone should follow
Nicole wrote on Twitter that she enabled her mother as an emergency contact, telling her followers that she couldn’t “emphasize” enough the importance of enabling this feature on her phone
The five crash victims were returning from a night out in Cardiff when their white VW Tiguan swerved off the road at high speed and crashed into trees and undergrowth. Three have died, two are seriously injured and in hospital.
The automatic message can be seen in the screenshot of the message. It says, “Crash Detected SOS.
“Nicole Samuel called emergency services from this approximate location after the iPhone detected a crash.
“You are receiving this message because Nicole listed you as an emergency contact.”
In full, Nicole wrote on Twitter that she enabled her mother to be an emergency contact, writing, “I can’t stress this enough!! This text was sent to my mother from my iPhone after my car accident.
“Listing someone as an emergency contact can be a matter of life and death. Please please please stop what you are doing and add a family member or share this with someone else.’
Other users have followed this advice and commented on how “important” it is to share this feature.
One user tweeted, “I’m glad you share this girl! I hope you are well and have a speedy recovery.’
Another said: “Brilliant and important feature.”
A third added: “I did that. saves your life Best thing ever!!!’
One person asked how their phone knew they were in an accident and wrote: “Hope you’re ok!! Just wondering how your phone contacted emergency services or do you have to press the button on the side?’
And Nicole replied: “No, you don’t press any button, it detects the crash itself and does everything for you!! It’s incredible.’
While another person reiterated the importance of having this on your phone, she said: “As an 911 operator I can confirm these calls connect directly to 999 and we connect them to the police when nobody is speaking to us . If you answer the line, we can put you through to whatever other emergency services you require.’
And a fifth person wrote: “I’m glad you’re doing well! This is such a great feature. For those who are asking, accident detection is included on the new iPhones as a safety feature – if it thinks you’ve been in an accident and you don’t respond to your phone, it will automatically call emergency services! Didn’t know anything about contacts either!’
While another person said that the same feature can be enabled for the Apple Watch as well.
They wrote: “My dad actually took a bad fall while wearing his Apple Watch and this alerted me and my sister so we could take immediate action. Luckily he was only slightly injured but as they live almost two hours away it’s really comforting that we were notified.’
How to enable Emergency SOS on your iPhone
Nicole wrote that enabling this feature is “honestly a lifesaver.” Here’s how to add an emergency contact on your iPhone:
Here’s how to do it for Android
You can use the Personal Safety app to store and share your emergency information.
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