Friday, January 27, 2023 1:28 pm4 Comments

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The first use of Apple iPhone’s new Emergency SOS via satellite in B.C. looks to have saved the lives of two women who were stranded in the wilderness near McBride.

A new safety feature that provides customers peace of mind is now available in the U.S. and Canada across the iPhone 14 lineup — Emergency SOS via satellite. Users can now message emergency services without Wi-Fi or cell service.

Hanna Petersen for the Times Colonist:

Luckily one of the two women had the iPhone 14, when the pair got lost on their trip back to Alberta on Dec. 23.

An accident had closed the highway so the women checked Google Maps for an alternate route and decided to take a detour through the Holmes Forest Service Road.

The road was partially plowed, as it had been plowed the previous week, and the women made to where the grader had stopped.

“Then it was basically a wall of snow and when they tried to get through it, they got stuck,” explained Dwight Yochim, senior manager with BC Search and Rescue.

He said they were approximately 20 kilometres down the road, stuck in the snow with no one knowing where they were and no cell service.

“There’s no cell service there but one of them happened to have the new Apple phone that has the SOS in it and activated the SOS and to my knowledge, that’s the first use of the SOS in British Columbia.”

“They found them, pulled their vehicle out and got them turned around and back on the way,” said Yochim. “It’s the kind of thing that it potentially may have saved their life.”

MacDailyNews Take: Yet more lives saved thanks to an Apple device!

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