(I said this was gonna be about Apple products. But this post isn’t.)
I just got a new Samsung Galaxy Note 7! I can’t wait to power up this bad boy!
An hour later…
And done! Let’s use this outside! Oh, look at this cool 12MP camera! And this-
*phone explodes*
Did my phone just explode?! Did Samsung seriously make an exploding phone?!
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You heard me right. An exploding phone. The Samsung Galaxy Note 7 actually did explode. Let’s dive in to see why.
The Samsung Galaxy Note 7 was released on August 19, 2016. It was the last phone in the Note series (my grandma has a Note 20) to have a home button and the first to have a USB-C connector. And for the first week and a half, it was just a normal phone. After all, nobody thought it was gonna explode or something.
Then came August 31. There wasn’t any reports of exploding yet, but that day, there were reports that Samsung was delaying shipments of the phone to certain countries to perform additional tests. Right now, we still don’t have a very precise idea of why the phone explodes, but it does have something to do with the phone itself.
All of a sudden, the next day, Samsung was preparing to recall the device worldwide due to the battery! We can now conclude that the phone exploded because of the battery. But why because of the battery? Did it explode when it ran out of battery! Or when it overheated? Let’s see.
The day after that (September 2), Samsung stopped selling the Galaxy Note 7 worldwide. That’s pretty quick for a phone. Samsung also announced an informal recall for some phones because the battery overheated. That means the phone exploded when the battery overheated.
A week later (September 8), the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) warned people to not turn on or charge the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 in fear of it exploding or catching fire on airplanes. That wouldn’t exactly be convenient for people whose only device is a Samsung Galaxy Note 7 and they have to make an important call. But airplanes are loud, so it would be hard to make a call anyway. (That’s my assumption. I’ve never been on a plane before so correct me) The next day, the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) basically made the same statement, but for the European Union.
On September 13, Samsung announced that it would release an update to Galaxy Note 7 phones in South Korea that would prevent the phone from being charged over 60%.
Two days later, the Consumer Product Safety Commission officially recalled the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 in the United States. The commission recommended that all owners of the phone stop using it and trade it in for a replacement (also a Samsung Galaxy Note 7).
The replacement Samsung Galaxy Note 7 had different batteries supplied by Amperex Technology Limited, who also supplies batteries for the iPhone. iPhones don’t explode, so that means the Galaxy Note 7 will be safe.
Or will it?
Find out in Part 2, coming out soon. (Within a few days and not a few centuries)
