Help: Camera flooded, memory card got wet, is photo recovery hopeless?

[cxg31s]

I can't figure out if this is the right forum for this question, so if not, please feel free to move it somewhere more appropriate.

Short story: My housing flooded on my last trip 2 months ago, camera got partially wet including the memory card--it wasn't soaked but some water did get in the card compartment. I pulled the memory card, shook out the water and dried it with a hair dryer on low heat. I was able to see the pictures in my husband's camera, but it "glitched" when we tried to download them to the computer then it said "This card cannot be used". I have since been able to see the photos again in my husband's camera but it kept doing the same thing when I tried to download. I just bought a replacement camera, put in the memory card and again got "This card cannot be used".

So I guess what I need to know is can my pictures be saved or it is hopeless? Would it be worth trying to find a recovery service or can they even salvage a card that has gotten wet?

Thanks so much for any advice, tips, etc!

 

[Cave Diver]

I had something similar happen to a card once. My first suggestion is to try cleaning the contacts (little copper looking strips) on the SD card. Try a q-tip with some rubbing alcohol or a pencil eraser to make sure the contacts are clean and there is no film of salt or anything left on it.

My next suggestion is that if your husbands camera is reading it, can you attach that to your computer via USB cable and download the pics straight to your computer that way?

BTW. Even if you do manage to get it working in your computer with the above tips, I'd consider the card unreliable and not attempt to continue using it.


Good luck with it!

 

[dmoore19]

you may be able to do a disk repair on the card. If this is a windows XP computer. If not you might try doing a help search to see if your OS has this ability.

I don't want to say it will work, but it might.

Good Luck

[h=1]Detecting and repairing disk errors[/h] You can use the Error-checking tool to check for file system errors and bad sectors on your hard disk.

1. Open My Computer, and then select the local disk you want to check.
2. On the File menu, click Properties.
3. On the Tools tab, under Error-checking, click Check Now.
4. Under Check disk options, select the Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors check box.

Notes

• To open My Computer, double-click the My Computer icon on the desktop.
• All files must be closed for this process to run. If the volume is currently in use, a message box will appear prompting you to indicate whether or not you want to reschedule the disk checking for the next time you restart your system. Then, the next time you restart your system, disk checking will run. Your volume will not be available to perform other tasks while this process is running.
• If your volume is formatted as NTFS, Windows automatically logs all file transactions, replaces bad clusters, and stores copies of key information for all files on the NTFS volume.
• For more information, click Related Topics.

Related Topics

 

[flareside]

If you can see photos I doubt recovery is hopeless but we need more information:

What type of card?
How are you attempting to download to computer? Are you using a card reader and can you get any kind of a directory structure to show up?
Is the card lock switch activated?

 

[Gilligan]

Another option if all the photos are not readable is to use a photo rescue program.

I purchase Photo Rescue some time ago and have used it successfully on corrupted cards but not wet ones.

Follow the instructions that come with the program.

There are other programs out there and some are free.

Good luck.

 

[Damselfish]

assuming you were diving salt water - if you have something like this happen in the future I'd personally rinse the card or whatever in fresh water before letting let it dry. The gut reaction is to get something dried out asap and more water may sound counter-intuitive. But it's already wet, and electronics of any sort just don't like salt. May improve your chances of rescuing things, though I agree I wouldn't rely on a card that was damaged especially if there were any signs of flakiness.

My husband has a habit of leaving things in his pockets - recently a USB key went through the washer and dryer and seems just fine. I suspect a dunk in salt water would have done more damage.

 

[Rooster59]

Damselfish is right, the salt causes most of the problems.

If a card gets wet with salt, flood with fresh water asap. I shake off all the fresh water, and flood with alcohol- as high a percentage of alcohol as possible. Then shake off the alcohol and dry with low heat, sunshine, air, etc.

You may still have salt in the circuit, and with humidity in the air the salt makes conductive paths that screw everything up while corroding it all just for fun.


In this case I would flood fresh -> flood alcohol -> dry it, and try again.

I've done this and fixed sim and flash cards in cell phones.

 

[seasea]

Just want to share my experience here as well. My camera bag got wet while on a scuba diving trip. The camera (Sony Nex 5N) and SD card (32GB San Disk) got soaked. Based on past experience, I left them in rice to soak up the humidity for several days. Then I cleaned the contacts of the SD card. I looked online and tried software recovery such as ZAR and Rescue Pro. But nothing worked. I was desperate. I didn't want to loose my precious memories like this.


Thus, I looked for recovery services. Based on the positive reviews, I chose Recoverfab , fix repair CF SD SDHC memory card/flash drive-format error software. I was a little skeptical sending my SD card in, all the way to Germany. But when I saw 466 of my photos and 18 videos. I relaxed. i recommend giving them a try if you are at a wit's end like me. Worth the price.

 

[henri2398]

There are few things that you can do to restore photos from water damaged memory card.

1st solution – Keep the card in the sun to get it dry and then connect it with your camera or PC and check whether al files are available there or not.

2nd solution – Insert memory card into car reader and connect it with PC and see, if you are able to access your photos. You can also copy and paste data from your card to other destination and then check whether you are able to access your photos.

3rd Solution – If above mentioned solution fails, then use photo recovery software which is designed to scan damaged SD card and restore digital media files from it.

 

[Timmyjoe]

I've had good luck with CardRescue software on messed up SD cards on my Mac. Not sure it is available for PC. I think it was only about $35.