Airtag finds itself in the wild!

Our dog Maple has a habit of wandering off while on hikes. A few times she’s been gone long enough we’ve been quite worried about her safety. To solve this dilemma, we bought an 苹果 #Airtag, along with a super waterproof and shockproof case that we attached to Maple's harness. If she runs off, we get a pretty good idea of where she is especially if she wanders back into civilisation.

Maple is a dog on the edge: constantly chasing boars, and birds, running into the jungle, climbing frightening rocks.

The other day I asked Tess if she had gone hiking with Maple, to which she replied no. “Odd,” I thought because Maple’s Airtag was showing up on a hiking trail from earlier that day. This sometimes happens when the connection to the Airtag is a bit glitchy but eventually syncs. Then a few days later Maple came back from a super wet and muddy hike. As her harness went into the wash, I realised the Airtag had come off of her harness. I checked and sure enough, there it was still on the hiking trail. Not that glitchy after all.

We decided to plan a rescue. Tess and I thought this would be an exciting adventure. Not unlike finding a needle in a haystack. After work, we headed out for a hike with the dogs before losing daylight. The dogs were chuffed to be having a mid-week hike. Little did Maple know we were out hunting for the very thing we use to track her. If Maple was a human, she would certainly object.

Using Find My iPhone we headed toward where the Airtag last reported itself. That was Wednesday afternoon when another iPhone user would have walked close enough to the Airtag to pick up a signal. (Each Airtag sends out a unique encrypted Bluetooth identifier; through crowdsourcing other Apple devices can detect it and relay the location of the Airtag directly to an owner’s Apple ID account. This entire process is end-to-end encrypted so that no one but the owner of the Airtag—not the owners of the crowdsourced devices picking up the Airtag’s location or even Apple itself—ever has access to the Airtag’s current or past location. [Fast Company]).

Tess and I had prepared for a big hunt, with work gloves on hand in the event we had to pick through branches, leaves, rocks etc. that might have washed the device away during the recent typhoons and floods.

Well, it was all very anticlimactic.

Within ten metres of where the device last reported itself, my iPhone informed me the Airtag was now with me. I then pressed “Find Nearby”, and my iPhone gave me the exact distance I was from the Airtag and what direction, via an arrow, to move. I also pressed “Make Sound" and from the ground we heard a Start Trekkie type beeping. Incredible! Next thing we knew we were almost standing on top of it. The Airtag was still safely in its case, just off the path, hiding under a small branch. A screw had come loose where the case attached itself to Maple’s harness. Easily replaceable. (The case is not an Apple product, lol!)

Tess and I marvelled at Apple’s Airtag technology and hiked the remaining 5K to our exit destination. The dogs were very happy, Maple didn’t run away, but the water was a bit deep for Hope and she needed rescuing

Each of us in the family (including kids) has two Airtags and I have four. We use them to keep track of luggage when travelling, passports, wallets, (yes you can get custom wallets that perfectly fit an Airtag), keys, backpacks and yes… Maple, too. ?

Do you have an Airtag? If so how have you used it? And if you enjoyed this post, please like, comment, share. Thank you for reading!