I was out Monday on my daily run when I foolishly started messing with my iPhone (I was having trouble getting one of the AirPod Pros to connect to bluetooth). I proceeded to trip on a raised portion of sidewalk caused by a tree root. I took a hard fall. Other than scratches and wounded pride I was not hurt. I noticed quickly that my Apple Watch detected the fall and was prepared to call the emergency number. Because I was not hurt I was able to cancel the call before it went out. The good news, besides not being seriously hurt, was that the technology works and can be a tremendous safety feature. In my estimation, this and other related health and fitness features make the watch worth the investment if one never used it for the time or other features.
Thanks fore testing this for us! Seriously, though glad you weren’t hurt too bad.
Its funny you bring this up, as I was just on a run and thinking about faking a fall just to see if it works. Kind of a stupid idea that was, so you saved me the time 
I’m glad I could save you the trouble and pain! 
I turned it off due to false positives. Your note about your recent experience encouraged me to turn it back on and update my medical alert info.
Thanks for the encouragement – hope you’re feeling ok.
You are welcome, and I’m doing well. Thank you for your concern. By the way, I have never had a false positive on it. Maybe I need to get more active in my running.
Glad you are ok. I’ve gotten several false positives when I was wrestling with my boys at bedtime. But, I will say I took a pretty good fall off the bed! Definitely a great safety feature.
I’ve gotten some false positives during self-defense classes that involved punching bags.
So are you saying that you took a fall when fighting the punching bags? 
Had a few false positives but not enough to be a problem. When I did have a minor fall it triggered properly. I would rather have the occasional false positive than a false negative.
I had false positives with Fall Detection when clapping, and when hammering nails. I’ve also had false positives with Handwashing when trying to open pickle jars with tight lids and squeezing oranges.
I once had a false positive with SOS when I was a passenger in a car on bumpy car ride, my coat was rubbing against and pushing the crown, and my watch called 911.
Same here. I was living in an area where ice was an issue during Winter and took a spill - the detection never fired off. However, later during the summer when I was cutting fire wood, it was firing off after every other swing, to the point I just removed my Watch until we were done chopping.
The same thing happened to me on Space Mountain at Disney World. The bar was pressing against the button and called 911. I didn’t realize it until they called back. I was startled.
Be glad it did not stay in sleep mode 
Mine called 911 while I was on a roller coaster at Great America. This was a ride where they advertise 0-70 mph in a second or something crazy like that. I’m guessing that’s what triggered it. Dispatch called me and left a message since I didn’t answer, then I started getting calls from my emergency contacts.
At least I know I’m not alone and that the services work.
Can fall detection be enabled / disabled by Siri or shortcuts? Being able to ask Siri to suspend fall detection for x minutes sounds like it might be a useful feature.
A couple weeks back I got a flat tire and using the car’s scissor jack and had the car up a couple inches when the scissor jack collaped and “nudged me” (and older Audi A6) and that triggered the fall detection. I was trying too sort out what alert was being insistent, and marked it as I was fine (somebody still tried too call and check on me). I called for the car service to come and change the tire.
I’ve not had any false triggers nor actual falls (but with highly distracted drivers these days), but I’m keeping this on.
I have never gotten a false positive. I upgraded to a new watch in October and restore from backup failed, and of course I forgot to turn on fall detection since it’s normally off for my age group. Stands to reason that’s when we got an early snow storm and I fell while crossing the street. Finally got my chance to test it out and my setting was wrong. 
No damage, I hope?