Published May 19, 2023 | 1:18 PM ⚊ Updated May 19, 2023 | 1:45 PM
Screengrab from the video of the phone catching fire.
A 76-year-old man in the Thrissur district of Kerala narrowly escaped from suffering burn injuries after his mobile phone, kept in his shirt pocket, burst and caught fire spontaneously on Thursday, 18 May, morning.
This is the third such incident in the state in less than a month, of a mobile phone exploding. It occurred while the man was having tea at a shop in the Marottichal area in Thrissur.
Visuals of the incident went viral and were also shown on TV channels. The man can be seen casually sitting at a table in the shop having tea and eating something. That is when the phone in his shirt pocket bursts with a sound and catches fire.
The elderly man immediately jumps up, knocking over his tea glass, and frantically tries to pull out the phone from his pocket. His frenetic attempts save him. The phone falls from his pocket onto the floor, and he manages to walk away from the place unhurt.
An officer of Ollur police station, under whose jurisdiction the incident occurred in the district, told PTI that the septuagenarian was unhurt.
The officer said that on receiving information regarding the incident, he called up the elderly man to find out what happened.
The man told police that he had bought the phone for ₹1,000 a year ago and that it was a feature phone. “Till now, there were no problems with the device”, said the man to the police, according to the officer.
Last week, a similar incident happened in Kozhikode, Kerala, where a man suffered burns when a mobile phone kept in his trouser pocket exploded.
Before that, on 24 April, an eight-year-old girl hailing from Thrissur died after a mobile phone she was using exploded.
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