You might have heard about smartphones exploding due to battery issues and what not. Samsung experienced the hard way after the company had to recall all units of Samsung Galaxy Note 7 Edge after several units exploded around the globe. So, to shed light on what’s new in the ‘burning’ tech world, a report claiming that an Apple iPhone XS Max reportedly exploded while in the back pocket of its user.
The story, first covered by iDropNews has Josh Hillard, a resident of Columbus, Ohio, got fishy when a pungent smell rose around the vicinity and a burning sensation to his buttocks. This is when he realized that the Apple iPhone XS Max which was at his jeans’ back pocket has become too hot and caught fire. As the story goes, he went into an empty boardroom to remove his pants and this is when the phone combusted. He later doused it with a fire extinguisher only to find out the phone is no more in working order. In fact, the fire caused damage to his pants and has burned the affected region of his buttocks.
Josh rushed to an Apple store to report the issue where it was arrogantly treatment Further, he spent 20 minutes talking to a rep at Apple Care reporting the issue. He quoted that he wasn’t offered a spare phone as the staff asked him to surrender the phone for examining. Only after a serious call to the Apple Care, he was offered an out-of-the-box unit of iPhone XS Max while the Cupertino-based Apple bore all the cost of providing a free replacement.
However, Hillard wasn’t happy with the resolution since there is a number of key points to be accessed here. Firstly, although he was offered a replacement, the company didn’t offer him compensation since the exploded phone damaged his jeans while injuring him as well. Further, there were no comments from the staff as to how a smartphone could catch fire without any trigger. As of now, Josh is consulting from a legal team to take action against the smartphone maker alleging selling of faulty products and no compensation when such incident is reported.
On the contrary, Apple hasn’t acknowledged the incident yet and hasn’t actually posted any statement claiming its authenticity. Smartphones are powered by lithium-ion batteries which are susceptible to heat and various other stimuli causing it to overheat or even explode in rare cases. But again, this isn’t the first time a phone has reportedly caught fire. Either it was Samsung Galaxy Note 7, then a Xiaomi Mi A1 and an iPhone X too reported a similar issue last year.
