We recently received a 16 GB AT&T iPhone 5 from an owner in Huntsville, Alabama, who had an interesting story to share. The device's owner explained that at the time the damage occurred, the iPhone 5 was being used to take a photo out the window of a vehicle … while the car was moving at high speeds! As the picture of the damage clearly illustrates, the smartphone user failed the multitasking test.
To be fair, we don't know if the iPhone owner was the driver or a passenger in the vehicle, but we'd like to hope that he wasn't practicing unsafe driving. For a bit of back story, the state of Alabama enacted new legislation on August 1, 2012, that banned texting while driving. Alabama became the 38th state to enact this type of anti-texting law, and a Hands-Free Info article from November detailed that Alabama's law was established to counter the growing problem of distracted driving and make the state's highways safer for all.
This iPhone owner may have learned his lesson, as the device was dropped, landing on the street at a high speed and nearly sliding into a sewer. When we received the phone, we could see that the glass digitizer was very badly damaged. The back casing was also pretty scratched up, and the home button had gone mysteriously missing, never recovered from its roadside accident. However, after performing a diagnostic, we found that the internal components were all still working properly and the device was a good candidate for an iPhone repair.
We replaced the screen and glass front of the iPhone to get it fully functional once again. We also replaced the back casing due to the extent of the cosmetic damage to the back. We happily sent the iPhone back to the owner looking as good as new and ready to be used. Hopefully, the phone won't find itself colliding with any pavement at high speeds again.