Recently I read the story about Florence Arthaud; she’s a world-class international around-the-world race winner (the 1990 of the Route du Rhum among other races), but the focus of the story was how she was rescued from falling overboard because she had her cell phone in a waterproof case and used it to alert help. I’ve fried a few cell phones in my day; I dropped one in my head. I fell overboard in the marina when I pulled my breast line to board and stepped to anticipate the rail of my boat only to miss it because she was aground in her slip on a very low tide and spilled a glass of water on my wife’s purse bathing her one-day-old iPhone to death. Cell phones have become de rigueur for sailors. We depend on their reliability, so what is it we can do to make sure they are always ready in case of a wet situation?
There are many options available.. One was what Arthaud had done and that was encasing her phone in a waterproof cover, a great option. It saved her phone and her life. If you search the web, there are many different products that fit that bill, mostly covers that are bulkier than the phone itself but will protect your phones and are at reasonable costs, about $20-40. In all the cases of my frying phones these would have saved the day, and the phone. I think on board it’s just a prudent and easy option to slip it into a cover for the sail, thereby insuring its viability.
Another option involves nano technology, and this option is my favorite because I want to be known as someone who would use nano on something like a cell phone (because it works but more importantly, it just sounds so cool). This product is applied by Liquipel, a tech company in CA that you send your phone to and they return it in a day or so after applying the nano (I just love saying it) product, for about $60. They immerse your phone in a proprietary process that removes all the air from the inside of the phone and essentially coats it in a vapor that bonds to every part leaving it "watersafe for years to come.’ This award-winning process can save your life, and your phone. Bottom line here sailors, make sure that your phone is ready when you need it.
~Captain Art Ross
