Diving anyway Even though you know you can’t find it.

[Ana]

If I was to ask someone else to recover something for me (even topside) I'd skip the guy claiming 100% success rate.
For me that statement tells me the person hasn't been doing this very long.
Even if you look for stuff topside, there's not 100% success if you do it for a while.

 

[Justin Bove]

If you have a metal detector, depth is around 30 feet, and the location is within a hundred foot circle I'd try to recover it. I wouldn't BS them and stress the facts. One being the phone might be DOA because of the water, two the visibility is 3 inches, the weeds & mud will make it impossible to find, and lastly it will be almost impossible to find. If they hear all the facts and still want you to do a recovery then I'd do it and wouldn't care about it affecting your recovery rate.

 

[edwants2dive]

A cellphone in 6" of visibility is a needle in a haystack and it's toast anyway can't imagine why someone would pay good money for a very slim chance to recover a useless item.

I would say they could have possibly had insurance on the phone that required turn in of the item for replacement.... maybe

 

[ReefHound]

A cellphone in 6" of visibility is a needle in a haystack and it's toast anyway can't imagine why someone would pay good money for a very slim chance to recover a useless item.

Depends on what they have on the phone and how much they want it. Not everyone backs up or syncs to the cloud. My gf dropped her cellphone into 15' of salt water in the Caymans a few years back. She hadn't backed up in years. It was the first night there, we'd been having beers, and I wasn't freediving into unknown black water for it. Next morning I went down and got it back, rinsed it in fresh water a few minutes, then put in a bag of rice. A week later it showed signs of life but wouldn't charge enough to boot. Took it to a cell doc, replaced the charger port for $60, and it worked well. It was corroded inside but we were able to back up and retrieve all the videos, pics, and texts. She got a new phone a week later and tossed the old one in the trash. The phone had no future from the second it hit the water but the data was able to be recovered.

So the reason someone might pay good money for a very slim chance is to recover priceless and irreplaceable data.

 

[Basking Ridge Diver]

Most phones these days are good to 3 meters or 9 feet - freshwater dunk has a better chance than saltwater. They are water resistant not waterproof. Don't hand your phone over the water - keep it in your pocket till you are safely aboard. YMMV

 

[kelemvor]

I would have told them that unless it was in a waterproof case it was a write-off once the water shorted it out and did they still want you to try?

It could have been the content on the phone they wanted.

An SD card is likely to be completely fine after being submerged if you dry it before using it. If you wanted the data off the internal storage (Apple product or didn't bother with sd card), you could send it off to have the memory chips removed so that the data could be extracted. That has a very high chance of success, but obviously costs money.

 

[Justin Bove]

iPhones are pretty water resistant now.

 

[kelemvor]

iPhones are pretty water resistant now.

I think most modern high end phones are pretty water resistant. Kind of like old school "digital" watches, we're finally there. Here's a fun video where a guy takes a bunch of phones on a scuba dive down to 30'. This was 3 generations of phones ago, so I can only hope that modern phones are even better.

 

[Bob DBF]

I would have done the same thing, as a matter of fact I have, as well as in my usual line of work. As long as the person footing the bill knew the odds, I'm up for the underdog position. Sometimes I cut the price if I have nothing to do, and/or consider it an interesting challange.


Bob

 

[ibj40]

I did this, once, for a friend of a friend. Guy dropped a brand new watch his wife had given him for their anniversary while he was washing his sailboat, moored in a marina, in a fresh water lake. Organics in the water absorbed even the brightest dive light I had with me within the first 15 feet.

I surfaced to take a break, and a bystander says: "Well once you get down there, just lay down flat on the bottom and move your hands around until you find it."

I asked him how long the marina had been there, and did he have any idea about how many lawn chairs, fishing rod and reels, etc. had fallen overboard?

He looked me with a blank expression.

I packed up my gear and went home.