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Why a Helium Leak Disabled Every iPhone in a Medical Facility
Motherboard ^ | October 30, 2018 | By Daniel Oberhaus

Posted on 10/31/2018 4:08:55 PM PDT by Swordmaker

The bizarre incident happened during the installation of an MRI machine and was a surprise to everyone except Apple.


An IT worker at a medical facility made a remarkable discovery about iPhones and Apple watches earlier this month, after a freshly installed MRI machine appeared to disable every iOS device in the hospital.

As detailed in a post on the r/sysadmin subreddit, Eric Woolridge, a system administrator at Morris Hospital in Illinois, was flooded with calls on October 8 after several iPhones owned by hospital employees all stopped working for no discernible reason. At the time, the hospital was having a new MRI machine installed, which is used to make high resolution scans of the brain.

MRIs work by producing a very strong magnetic field, so Woolridge initially assumed that the phones were disabled by an electromagnetic pulse generated by the machine. There was just one problem: an EMP would have disabled all electronic devices, not just iPhones. Yet when Woolridge did a tour of the facility, he discovered the issue was isolated to about 40 Apple phones, tablets, and watches. Android phones were just fine, as was the rest of the computer equipment at the facility.

According to Woolridge, most of the Apple devices in the facility “seemed completely dead.” Many wouldn’t give any indication of charging when plugged into the wall and had issues connecting to the cellular network, but not the wifi.

As Woolridge later discovered, the MRI installation involves supercooling the giant magnet in the machine by boiling off liquid helium. This evaporated helium is usually pumped out of the facility through a vent, but this vent was leaking the helium into the rest of the facility. In all, about 120 liters of helium (or about 90,000 cubic meters in its gaseous state) was pumped out of the MRI room and an untold amount leaked into the rest of the hospital.

Woolridge ran some tests of his own to see if helium could shut down an iPhone. He placed an iPhone 8+ in a sealed bag and added some helium. In a video of the test Woolridge runs a stopwatch app on the phone. The stopwatch increasingly speeds up throughout the course of the video before the iPhone freezes at around eight minutes. The helium, it seemed, was messing with the iPhone’s clock.

As detailed in a blog post by the right-to-repair organization iFixit, helium atoms can wreak havoc on MEMS silicon chips. MEMS are microelectromechanical systems that are used for gyroscopes and accelerometers in phones, and helium atoms are small enough to mess up the way these systems function. Yet both Android and Apple phones use MEMS silicon for their devices, so why were only Apple phones affected?

The answer, it seems, is because Apple recently defected from traditional quartz-based clocks in its phones in favor of clocks that are also made of MEMS silicon. Given that clocks are the most critical device in any computer and are necessary to make the CPU function, their disruption with helium atoms is enough to crash the device.

In this case, the leaking helium from the MRI machine infiltrated the iPhones like a “tiny grain of sand” and caused the MEMS clocks to go haywire. This isn’t news to Apple, however, which explicitly mentions that “exposing iPhone to environments having high concentrations of industrial chemicals, including near evaporating liquified gasses such as helium, may damage or impair iPhone functionality” in the phone’s manual.

iFixit has a detailed explanation of how this all works over at its blog.


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Computers/Internet; Science
KEYWORDS: android; apple; applepinglist; helium; iphone; iphonesipads
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To: Yo-Yo

I did something extremely daring, something that rarely happens with Free Republic comment posters...I read the fine article.


One day, I’m gonna do that.


21 posted on 10/31/2018 4:51:55 PM PDT by Yaelle
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To: Swordmaker

The phones were fine. Everything coming out of the phone’s speakers was in a high, squeaky voice that no one could hear.


22 posted on 10/31/2018 4:53:13 PM PDT by moovova
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To: Yaelle

tHEy is subliminally sexist anyway.


23 posted on 10/31/2018 5:01:21 PM PDT by fluorescence
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To: Swordmaker

Why can’t MEMS be in gastight enclosures.


24 posted on 10/31/2018 5:02:50 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (May Jesus Christ be praised.)
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To: Yo-Yo

“I did something extremely daring, something that rarely happens with Free Republic comment posters...I read the fine article.”

That was extremely foolish of you.


25 posted on 10/31/2018 5:06:43 PM PDT by EEGator
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To: Swordmaker

The helium isn’t in a closed loop system? They vent it off to atmo?

Seems a bit wasteful. And isn’t helium supply kinda finite?


26 posted on 10/31/2018 5:08:52 PM PDT by AFreeBird
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To: akalinin

“What a waste. I thought they recycled the helium. “

i think many MRI models DO recycle helium ... but not all ...


27 posted on 10/31/2018 5:09:56 PM PDT by catnipman ((Cat Nipman: Vote Republican in 2012 and only be called racist one more time!))
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To: HiTech RedNeck
Why can’t MEMS be in gastight enclosures.

That's what puzzled me. I thought SiTime oscillators were silicon-silicon fusion bonded? Silicon is too tight a crystal for much helium to diffuse through at room temp.

I guess they must be silicon-pyrex anionic bonded. Helium easily slips right through pyrex.

28 posted on 10/31/2018 5:20:37 PM PDT by null and void (Don't argue with the keyboard warriors. They know their delusions better than you.)
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To: Yaelle

Okay, then maybe Welium.


29 posted on 10/31/2018 5:27:40 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (and btw -- https://www.gofundme.com/for-rotator-cuff-repair-surgery)
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To: null and void
Wrong. They are fusion bonded, but to thermal oxide, and with thermal oxide filled trenches to form electrical isolation.

Thermal oxide SiO2 is a first cousin of ordinary commercial glasses, and also will also leak helium. Not much, but it doesn't take much!

Anyone need a skilled MEMS process engineer?

30 posted on 10/31/2018 5:35:49 PM PDT by null and void (Don't argue with the keyboard warriors. They know their delusions better than you.)
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To: wally_bert
"Personium" is specist. I mean, we learned from Star Trek IV that humpback whales have been on the Earth 10 million years earlier.

31 posted on 10/31/2018 5:37:37 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (and btw -- https://www.gofundme.com/for-rotator-cuff-repair-surgery)
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To: AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Arthur Wildfire! March; Berosus; Bockscar; cardinal4; ColdOne; ...
I wonder what Sulfur Hexafluoride will do?
Gas Voices With Leonard and Penny - The Big Bang Theory

32 posted on 10/31/2018 5:40:08 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (and btw -- https://www.gofundme.com/for-rotator-cuff-repair-surgery)
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To: SunkenCiv

As far as jamming a timer? Nope. Too fat!

But you can put it in a trash can an float an air filled ballon on it...


33 posted on 10/31/2018 5:42:28 PM PDT by null and void (Don't argue with the keyboard warriors. They know their delusions better than you.)
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To: null and void

The good news is it’s fixable. Two simple process steps.


34 posted on 10/31/2018 5:44:26 PM PDT by null and void (Don't argue with the keyboard warriors. They know their delusions better than you.)
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To: wattsgnu
Hmmmm. Read the article. I should try that sometime.

Where's the fun in that! :-)

35 posted on 10/31/2018 5:52:25 PM PDT by OldMissileer (Atlas, Titan, Minuteman, PK. Winners of the Cold War)
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To: Yo-Yo
"I did something extremely daring, something that rarely happens with Free Republic comment posters...I read the fine article."

But,but...why?😲

36 posted on 10/31/2018 5:54:38 PM PDT by Free in Texas (Celebrate diversity. Own firearms of every caliber.)
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To: SunkenCiv
How about Xelium?

37 posted on 10/31/2018 5:55:55 PM PDT by Right Wing Assault (Kill-googl,TWITR,FACBK,NYT,WaPo,Hlywd,CNN,NFL,BLM,CAIR,Antifa,SPLC,ESPN,NPR,NBA)
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To: null and void

Any military hardware make the switch? Oh the ignominy to be taken out by a party balloon!


38 posted on 10/31/2018 6:27:32 PM PDT by Ozark Tom
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To: SunkenCiv

Develop a voice like Zeus speaking from the top of Mt. Olympus???


39 posted on 10/31/2018 6:30:00 PM PDT by Ozark Tom
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To: Yo-Yo
I did something extremely daring, something that rarely happens with Free Republic comment posters...I read the fine article.

Hey! You're taking all the fun out of this!

40 posted on 10/31/2018 6:56:36 PM PDT by Ben Hecks
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