iPlunge: Rice Rescue
January 17, 2012 | Posted by Jamie Bray
A couple of weeks ago something tragic happened. I was getting ready for work and my mom called me. I had a brief conversation with her and as I was hanging up, my phone slipped out of my hands! I frantically tried to catch it before it landed on the tile floor, but instead I hit it right into the toilet bowl - from like 4 feet away... what are the chances?? I screamed at the top of my lungs and grabbed it out of there without hesitation almost as soon as it landed, but unfortunately it was fully submerged.
Once out of the toilet water, my phone flashed a couple of times and the screen went black. I couldn't turn it off and my alarm kept going off.... NOT a good sign.
My husband went to work researching ways to fix it. He came across a bunch of posts that said to turn the phone off, put it in a bag of rice and wait for at least 4 days. Two problems with this - 1. I couldn't turn it off, and 2. what was I going to do without my iPhone for 4 whole days?!
It seemed unlikely that a bag of rice would fix my phone, but I waited..... and I waited......
Finally day 4 arrived. I picked the grains of rice out of the crevices of the phone, charged it for a good hour and turned it on. IT WORKED! Or at least it appeared to be working. I thought that even if it seemed to be working, there HAD to be something wrong with it. There's no way that my precious phone could come out of a dip in the toilet completely unscathed. I put it through some tests. I sent a text, made a phone call, took a picture, listened to music, turned it off and on and talked to Siri. It was as good as new!
It's been a few weeks and my iPhone is still working great. I'm still shocked and thankful that the bag of rice actually worked!
A few things I've learned from this experience:
- To give myself some space from my phone. Do I really need to have it in the bathroom while I'm doing my hair??
- Take my own advice and always close the toilet lid.
- Rice + a Ziploc + Patience can fix a waterlogged iPhone. Amazing!