Cell Phone safety is becoming an issue in Asia after the sequential events involving the two giant technology companies, Apple and Samsung.
A week after the incident involving a 23-year-old flight attendant with China Southern Airlines being electrocuted when she took a call on her Apple device while it was charging, a man using a third-party charger to juice his iPhone 4 was intensely shocked and rushed to the hospital, slipped into coma and now in the Intensive Care Unit comes next. These events prompted Apple to post a guide to the Chinese version of its website, advising users to use only official chargers for their iOS gadgets. The company guaranteed that all of its products are "subject to stringent safety and reliability testing, and designed to meet government safety standards around the world."
Now, in Hong Kong, a couple has been relocated after a Samsung Galaxy S4 Smartphone exploded and burned their house to a crisp.
Mr. Du, as identified in the Xianguo.com report, asserts that his phone and its accessories were all genuine Samsung products. However, it is now impossible to determine because everything was destroyed.
As translated in the report, Mr. Du was sitting on the sofa playing “Love Machine” while his phone was charging when in abruptly exploded. He alarmingly tossed his phone onto the couch, resulting into fire. The flames then spread to the curtains and the whole house.
The couple, together with their dogs, was able to run out of the house unharmed. Unfortunately, almost everything in their house burnt to ash, including their Mercedes Benz. All of their neighbors where temporarily evacuated to give way as the firefighters cease the flames.
Whether or not the true culprit is the Smartphone, a fire department investigation primarily concluded of “no suspicious circumstances.”
Samsung said it will “carry out detailed investigations and tests to determine the cause of the incident.”
This is the second fire incident involving Samsung. Last year, a Galaxy S3 device owner was driving in his car when the device caught fire.
