Actually, yes! My brother found an iPhone outside of a road while doing his work rounds, and it was active with 911 on the phone! It had activated crash detection and made a call, but no one was around! He picked it up to hear dispatch asking if anyone was there, so he answered, saying he just found this random phone on the ground. The dispatch insisted on sending an officer to the location, and asked if he’d be so kind as to wait, so he did.
A few minutes later a patrol car rolled up, and the officers took a look around. No one was around, no sign of an accident. Bro answered a few questions about how/where he found the phone, handed it over, they thanked him for staying, and then he was allowed to go.
So yeah, they’ll go looking for the phone even if it goes off on its own. They said they were about to send rescue to the phones coordinates before he answered.
That’s great it worked and your family is okay!
I keep crashing detection on, but I turned fall & Siri off. Reason being is I have a playful dog. He likes to jump on me and knock me around. He’s already accidentally called emergency services once one my Apple Watch LOL. He bit the watch too hard and triggered it when he was play nomming my hand. That was fun explaining to them. I was SO embarrassed and my mom wouldn’t stop laughing. Freaking huskies.