14 DAY TRIAL // Samsung has almost completed the recall of its explosive Note 7, but it turns out that Apple is really struggling to take its place, as more and more iPhones that are reportedly exploding across the world make the headlines these days.
This time, it’s not an iPhone 7 that catches fire, but a 6 Plus, which burst into flames during class while it was in the back pocket of one of the students.
“I felt this crazy, hot burning in my leg,” Darin Hlavaty, student at Rowan College at Burlington County and iPhone 6 Plus owner, said. “Right as class was starting, my phone started smoking in my pocket. It was a fire.”
In most of the cases, phones with lithium-ion batteries catch fire or explode while charging, but this time, the reason isn’t really clear because the phone was sitting in his back pocket. The student, however, admits that he probably sat on it, which might have bent the phone and thus led to the fire.
Apple already investigating
Rebecca Bookbinder, one of the other students in the class, also explains that they heard a popping sound all of a sudden and then started to see smoke coming from his colleague’s pants.
“Everyone was kind of like, ‘What is that? What is that? And then we all realized that's his phone that combusted in the middle of class’,” Bookbinder was quoted as saying by 6abc.com.
The fire emergency team arrived at the college, but the fire was already out, with the student explaining that he had to kick the phone away because it was burning into flames.
Apple hasn’t provided a statement on this case, but the company confirmed it’s investigating, so more information could be released at a later time.
Seeing the iPhone 6 Plus catching fire, however, isn’t entirely surprising if the student indeed sat on it, as this particular model was affected by the famous bendgate issue that caused it to bend under strong forces. Most likely, it was the battery that bent this time, leading to a fire, but it’s up to Apple to decide the cause.
Just last week, reports of iPhone 7 also catching fire made the rounds, but right now, these seem to be just isolated reports that Apple isn’t commenting on for the time being.