iPhone 5 Kills Woman, Apple Investigating

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Your iPhone will kill you. In fact, it is probably plotting your demise as we speak.

Apple Inc is investigating an accident in which a Chinese woman was killed by an electric shock when answering a call on her iPhone 5 while it was charging, the U.S. technology company said on Monday.
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DarkStar_WNY said:
Let me guess, the investigation will find that she was holding it wrong?
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You'd have to be doing something horribly wrong to get killed by a battery that size. Short of ingesting it or having it explode in your mouth I'm not sure how this is even possible.
 
Probably using a cheap-ass chinese knock-off charger, in a chinese knockoff outlet, in a chinese knockoff housing development? :)
 
Turns out when use appliances directly after stepping out of the bath, bad stuff happens. :rolleyes:
 
Considering there's nothing high voltage between the USB charger transformer and the phone itself?

Pretty sure that myth is busted.
 
XamediX said:
Probably using a cheap-ass chinese knock-off charger, in a chinese knockoff outlet, in a chinese knockoff housing development? :)
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Since the iPhone is designed and made in China, aren't even the ones they sell in the US Chinese knock-offs? :confused: I mean, the generic ones come out of the exact same factories and you can bet no one is spending extra money to inspect the ones they send here any better. That's not cost effective.
 
Don't buy anything from someone who believes that iPhones are "designed in China". The likelihood that Foxconn is assembling knock-off iPhones is practically nil.
 
wonderfield said:
Don't buy anything from someone who believes that iPhones are "designed in China". The likelihood that Foxconn is assembling knock-off iPhones is practically nil.
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It'd be really hard to prove that Foxconn or a subsidiary/partner/sneaky-on-the-sly something or other isn't doing just that, but I'm guessing you have a credible source that says otherwise.
 
NeoNemesis said:
You'd have to be doing something horribly wrong to get killed by a battery that size. Short of ingesting it or having it explode in your mouth I'm not sure how this is even possible.
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It was plugged in. Sounds like a short.
 
malingjc said:
Considering there's nothing high voltage between the USB charger transformer and the phone itself?

Pretty sure that myth is busted.
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Unless there was a short between the power (240 volt) side of the trasformer and the USB ground, and thier house wiring wasn't grounded correctly. Then it's possible that the metal edge of the phone was then connected to the 240 volts from the plug. She would also have had to be bare foot or touching something that was grounded with her other hand for the current to travel though her heart and stop it.

Very unlikely that this all would happen, unless this was a cheap 3rd part adapter, and/or the phone had been messed up when someone replaced the battery. It's more likely something else killed her and they are using this as an excuse to get money.
 
nutzo said:
Unless there was a short between the power (240 volt) side of the trasformer and the USB ground, and thier house wiring wasn't grounded correctly. Then it's possible that the metal edge of the phone was then connected to the 240 volts from the plug. She would also have had to be bare foot or touching something that was grounded with her other hand for the current to travel though her heart and stop it.

Very unlikely that this all would happen, unless this was a cheap 3rd part adapter, and/or the phone had been messed up when someone replaced the battery. It's more likely something else killed her and they are using this as an excuse to get money.
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Indeed. Sounds like a non-story.
 
There almost certainly needs to be a defect in either the charger or the wall outlet or both plus some exotic physical circumstances (as others have noted) ... even with a 240V outlet, a properly grounded configuration will not electrocute you ... you would also have to grab your phone rather aggressively as I have touched improperly grounded 240V PC setups and you jerk your hand away damn fast when you get a shock ;)
 
She must of jail broke the phone and it shanked her, then made a run for it.
 
kbrickley said:
There almost certainly needs to be a defect in either the charger or the wall outlet or both plus some exotic physical circumstances (as others have noted) ... even with a 240V outlet, a properly grounded configuration will not electrocute you ... you would also have to grab your phone rather aggressively as I have touched improperly grounded 240V PC setups and you jerk your hand away damn fast when you get a shock ;)
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not always true some times a shock cam make you grab on it it depending of the Vand other factors. but yea i call bs on this story theirs no way a usb powered charger should be ably to kill you. even if the thing some how passed full line V though the phone the phone should have just died
 
tunatime said:
not always true some times a shock cam make you grab on it it depending of the Vand other factors. but yea i call bs on this story theirs no way a usb powered charger should be ably to kill you. even if the thing some how passed full line V though the phone the phone should have just died
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Oh, I agree which is why I said you would need to aggressively grab it where it would be clenched in your grip ... since a properly functioning charger would only output 5V and 1A to the phone it wouldn't be possible to get electrocuted without getting currently directly from the wall which would likely be in the 240V/15A range (which would have fried the phone if it was receiving that current and voltage) ... so there had to be something funky or she wouldn't have got a phone call (unless I am missing something here) :confused:
 
The story linked to on Reddit said that the phone was plugged in and she jumped out of the shower to answer the phone. My guess is shes wet and picked up the phone, water ran down the cable to the plug and she completed the circuit, zap.
 
malingjc said:
Considering there's nothing high voltage between the USB charger transformer and the phone itself?

Pretty sure that myth is busted.
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It takes next to nothing voltage to stop a heart, just gotta be unlucky enough for that to be the path.
 
It wasn't an electical shock. It was an emotional shock when she realized she could get more in an android phone for less money.
:p
 
There's no way she received a call on a phone that was (improbabaly) shorted to main. This is a stupid story meant to go viral among stupid people.
 
The story linked to on Reddit said that the phone was plugged in and she jumped out of the shower to answer the phone. My guess is shes wet and picked up the phone, water ran down the cable to the plug and she completed the circuit, zap.
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Dummy should have had a lifeproof case and shed be alive today lol
 
malingjc said:
Considering there's nothing high voltage between the USB charger transformer and the phone itself?
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It takes very little current to interrupt heart rhythm, much less than the 1A an iPhone charger outputs.

There could be all kinds of other problems which contributed to her death, like wiring faults (if she touched an appliance which saw her connection as a ground) or using a poorly made 3rd party charger in the worst possible situation.
 
* which saw her connection to the iPhone to the charger as a ground
 
weebling1 said:
It takes next to nothing voltage to stop a heart, just gotta be unlucky enough for that to be the path.
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It takes current to stop a heart, current = voltage/resistance. Unless you have uber low resistance to electricity, it's going to take more than 5V to kill you. I'd think even if you're soaking wet, it'd take more than 5V to provide the current to kill you (don't try this at home, I'm not an electrical engineer, I'm just taking a guess ;) Though if you plan to try it, let us know first, if we don't get a follow up response we'll assume it killed you :D).
 
Tudz said:
It takes current to stop a heart, current = voltage/resistance. Unless you have uber low resistance to electricity, it's going to take more than 5V to kill you. I'd think even if you're soaking wet, it'd take more than 5V to provide the current to kill you (don't try this at home, I'm not an electrical engineer, I'm just taking a guess ;) Though if you plan to try it, let us know first, if we don't get a follow up response we'll assume it killed you :D).
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I had to look it up but apparently it is all about current:

1-10 Milliampers
Person will feel little or no electrical shock effects or sensation.
10-20 Milliampers
Painful shock will occur like a jolt, but muscle control will not be lost at this amperage.
20-75 Milliampers
This shock is more serious. You'll receive a a painful jolt and muscle control will be lost resulting in the inability to let go of something you may have grabbed that is shocking you.
75-100 Milliamperage
As the current approaches 100 milliamperes, ventricular fibrillation of the heart occurs and damage is done.
100-200 Milliamperes
Ventricular fibrillation occurs and death can occur if medical attention is not administered quickly.
Over 200 Milliamperes
Severe burns and severe muscle contractions occur. Your heart can stop during a shock because the chest muscles put pressure on the heart. Internal organs can be damaged at this stage and in you survive, a painful recovery can be expected. What may surprise you about this level of shock is that through this clamping effect on the heart, ventricular fibrillation is avoided and the chances of a person's survival is good if the victim is removed from the electrical circuit.
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Still something had to be grossly wrong (a short somewhere) to send current through her ... we'll have to see what comes out of the investigation but I would be very surprised if this comes back at Apple ... but we'll just have to see what they find out
 
The human body resistance is about 10,000 oms of resistance that needs to be overcome before a shock would carry a level of lethal current and at ~5v that just isn't happening with a wall charger plug, heck it would be hard to do with a inverter smaller than say a industrial welding machine.
 
You guys need to read the article. It said she insert the phone in her vajayja for the "pleasure effect" when the charger came unhooked frome the phone. "Investigators" found the charging adapter to be defective from the beginning and was just a moment before something happen.
 
Nanan said:
The human body resistance is about 10,000 oms of resistance that needs to be overcome before a shock would carry a level of lethal current and at ~5v that just isn't happening with a wall charger plug, heck it would be hard to do with a inverter smaller than say a industrial welding machine.
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*Dry* skin has high resistance, and measuring between one point on the body and another, external resistance could be hundreds of kilo ohms to a couple of mega ohms. Once wet, that changes significantly. Internal body resistance is around 100 ohms. A standard iPhone 5V/1A charger can be dangerous in some situations.
 
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