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Assistance and Incident Detection

I am very excited about the Assistance feature as I often run alone on a rail trail and I have always had to carry a separate tag that I can press to alert my husband that I am in trouble (which, thankfully, I have never had to use). And I also always use LiveTrack. But I am a little confused about the Incident Detection, as described in the manual:

"Incident detection: Allows the Garmin Connect app to send a message to your emergency contacts when the Forerunner device detects an incident."

What does that mean, exactly? How does it detect an incident? Does it somehow detect that I have tripped on a rock and fallen? Maybe a Garmin rep could chime in here. These are important features for me and a big part of upgrading from my 935, but I want to understand how it works. Thanks!

0 Roland over 6 years ago

Watch this from 8:13
youtu.be/PsieO05pSf0

0 R_Tellis over 6 years ago

The way DCR described it is that it looks for a sudden stop that isn't followed by forward progress. His example was if you jump down a (small) ledge the watch will notice the impact of your landing and the sudden stop. If you don't start running again it would trigger the alert, but if you immediately continue on then it wouldn't.

0 lindajm22 over 6 years ago

Thank you! I will take a look tonight.

0 lindajm22 over 6 years ago

The way DCR described it is that it looks for a sudden stop that isn't followed by forward progress. His example was if you jump down a (small) ledge the watch will notice the impact of your landing and the sudden stop. If you don't start running again it would trigger the alert, but if you immediately continue on then it wouldn't.

Perfect! Thank you. That makes sense.

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

This sounds like a great feature in theory and would have been amazing to have hadwhenI broke my ankle running 3 weeks ago EXCEPT I never run with my phone so without LTE it doesn't work. And if I did run with my phone, wouldn't I just use that to message someone to pick me up? As it is, I would have had to still hobble 1.5km home. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining as it is a step in the right direction but unless the watch can send it itself, I don't see too many use cases where the runner wouldn't be able to just use their phone, if they have it on them.

0 Former Member over 6 years ago

I don't see too many use cases where the runner wouldn't be able to just use their phone, if they have it on them.

Knocked unconscious or to the point where you may not be coherent enough to use your phone.

0 cmerrill over 6 years ago

I have a Garmin InReach communicator. It sure would be nice if the incident detection could send a message via the satellite messenger. I am often out of cell coverage on the trails.

0 timgrose over 6 years ago

https://forums.garmin.com/forum/into...dent-detection has some thoughts.

I just started the timer on my 945 and shook my arm quite fast and it triggered.

0 timgrose over 6 years ago

I think most runners take their phone with them these day - I might want to say take the odd pic and I certainly have done since I also had an "incident" and only just managed to stagger back to my car. Plus my wife tells me off I don't ! I guess the point of an emergency is that if you can make a call it might well not be an emergency. Knock yourself out and you might be found.

0 lindajm22 over 6 years ago

https://forums.garmin.com/forum/into...dent-detection has some thoughts.

I just started the timer on my 945 and shook my arm quite fast and it triggered.

Thanks for the test results! I was going to do the same this weekend when my husband and I were both home so he didn't think I was really in trouble..lol Good to know that it is quite responsive. I do run with my phone always as I am often on a trail in the woods by myself, but if I trip and fall and somehow can't make a phone call it's comforting for my husband to now know that he will be notified of my position if that happens. It's not like being on the road where it would be more likely I'd be seen. Much better than the other service/device I was using for that.