Dropped Your Phone in Water? Don’t Panic Yet

Mobile phone technology is advancing all the time and one of the things that a lot of new mobile phones have IP technology or the ability to survive falling in water. However, if your handset does not have an IP rating and you accidentally drop it in water try not to panic. Here are some things you can do to try and recover the phone before you need to send it away for professional help.

Some of the older handsets do you have an IP rating, but this can be splashproof only which doesn’t help if your handset ends up taking swimming lessons in the toilet bowl or any other body of water. So what do you do if your phone gets wet and you don’t think it’s waterproof?

The first and most important thing is not to try and turn the phone on, leave the handset off or if it seems to be on turn it off. Now take the phone apart as much as possible; in many cases, the only removable parts are a Sim card and memory card. If this applies, take them out and if the battery is removable, remove it from the housing.

Use kitchen towel or any other form of towel to gently dry these parts and leave them on one side, now gently shake your handset to remove any water that might have got into the ports.

Some people think the best thing to do is follow instructional videos on the Internet to remove the screen and get inside the unit however this will immediately invalidate any warranty as the manufacturers can tell if the phone has been opened.

The bottom line is you are not a phone engineer, so do not pretend to be one. The next thing you need to do is go to the kitchen cupboard and get some rice, that’s right, plain uncooked rice is the next thing on our list. If you do not have any, it is well worth getting some as it could save your mobile phones life.

When you think about cooking rice, you may have noticed that a small handful of rice expands to create a large cooked bowl full. This is because rice is really good at sucking up the water, so grab your phone and all the components you have taken out and placed them all in a large bowl of dry uncooked rice. Some people think you should then place the container on the radiator or place the phone itself on the heater, but this is not a good idea.

What you can do is cover the bowl and put it in an airing cupboard or somewhere else warm and dry. It is important to note that heat will not help the situation you need to dry the phone out slowly. Leave the phone for three days completely untouched before seeing if it still works. Remember that iPhones have very smart water detectors so if you need to seek help tell the truth and don’t make up some sob story.