I worked as a repair technician for a couple years. We had contracts with local schools/businesses that had company phones, computers, tablets, and other tech devices, to provide tech support and/or in-house hardware and software repair. One day we got a call from a man saying that he accidentally forgot to take his work phone out of his pocket before he jumped in the ocean.
Now, if you’ve ever dealt with liquid damaged devices, you know how dodgy they can be as far as getting them back up and running. Sometimes they’ll get a drop of liquid in them and will never be able to come back on. While sometimes they’ll be lost at the bottom of a lake for a week and all you have to do is dry her out and put a new battery in and it works good as new.
So this guy calls and I tell him the procedure – do not try to turn it on or charge it, immediately power it down and take out the battery and let it sit for one to two days.
Customer: “Ok, I can definitely do that. Also, I read online that putting your phone in rice can help water damaged phones.”
Me: “Nothing is guaranteed when it comes to wet electronics. But rice can absorb moisture pretty well. Which is why sometimes you’ll see it in salt shakers in diners.”
Customer: “Seems kind of strange, but ok! I’ll bring her in in a few days.”
A couple of days pass. And a man walks up to the front counter holding a large looking object (we have cameras that display the entrance to us down the back where the work benches are). I figure some guy wants us to fix a printer or an old computer or something. I walk up front and recognize the man’s voice as the one who jumped in the ocean and I immediately assume something terrible has happened.
Customer: “Well I read some stuff online about keeping your phone in rice and I couldn’t imagine how that would work. Huh. Well I guess you let the tech guys keep doing tech things. I’ll tell you what, keeping this thing plugged in for two days probably ran my electric bill up a bit!”
He proceeds to open up a rice cooker, steam pouring out of the top as if he had just unplugged it, and fished out his phone from the bottom of a 4 inch deep sea of steamed rice with a pair of tongs.
TL;DR- Guy gets phone wet. Looks online for help, says to put phone in rice. Guy puts phone in rice…in a rice cooker…for two days nonstop.
Reddit User – “roganligby”