iPhone 5S Catches Fire While Charging, Causes Third-Degree Burns To Sleeping Teenager


A sleeping Albertan teenager was awoken with a start earlier this week when his iPhone 5S that he had plugged into the wall and left charging on a night stand burst into flames.

Josh Schultz, 16, received third-degree burns after his charging iPhone 5S went up in flames on a night table beside his bed while he slept. Carol Schultz, the boy’s mother, said Josh had been sleeping in the basement bedroom of their home when he began screaming. His screams woke up the rest of the house, and when they ran into his bedroom, the bed had caught fire due to the iPhone 5S that had overheated.

“He was on fire,” his mother said, “he woke up because he was in pain, and because his bed was on fire. We called 911. He grabbed a fire extinguisher and tried to put it out, while my husband was dousing the mattress with water.”

The exploding iPhone and subsequent fire caused third-degree burns to the teenager’s right hand and right leg, as well as to other parts of his body.

Schultz had had the iPhone 5S for about a year, his mother said, and had never had any problem with it. She also mentioned that the iPhone charge cord was in good shape. Carol and her husband both also use an iPhone and have never had a problem before.

“It just makes us scared to plug in our [iPhones],” Carol Schultz said, “How many people plug their phones in before they go to bed? Everybody, so it is charged in the morning.”

The family is staying at a local hotel for the moment while repairs to the house are done. The mother added that the family is still shaken up over the whole exploding iPhone ordeal and that her son is currently afraid to go to sleep.

The flaming iPhone caused damage to the nightstand, bed, mattress, as we as the walls of Josh’s bedroom and spread smoke throughout the entire house.

The local fire chief, John Weisgerber, has yet to provide a damage estimate, but he did say that so far, the damage seemed “minimal.”

“[The iPhone] got hot enough apparently to start on fire,” said chief Weisgerber.

This isn’t the first time that there have been reports of an iPhone catching on fire. In November of 2011, an iPhone caught fire on an Australian flight as the plane was landing. In February of 2014, a young girl in Maine had her iPhone explode in her pocket after the battery shorted out. In October of the same year, an Arizona man claimed that his iPhone 6 caught on fire in his pocket after it had been bent.

[Photo Credit: YouTube]

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