Farmer Loses Phone In Grain, Gets It Back From Japan

Losing one's phone is a bother, especially when that phone disappears into nearly 300,000 pounds of grain, which is why one farmer was so surprised this week when a nice person at the other end of the food processing supply chain called to say his lost phone had been recovered in Japan.

According to Rocket News 24, Kevin Whitney of Chickasha, Okla., watched his iPhone fall out of his shirt pocket and disappear into a grain elevator last October. As he watched his phone vanish into 280,000 pounds of grain, Whitney figured he'd best get a replacement.

"I never expected to see that phone again," he said.

But this week, nine months after the phone was lost, Whitney got a call from Japan, where a worker at a grain mill said he'd found the phone in a grain shipment and wanted to return it to its proper owner.

The phone reportedly traveled along with the grain shipment from Chikasha down the Arkansas and Missisippi rivers to Louisiana. From there, the grain and the phone were put on a cargo ship and sent across the Pacific Ocean to Kashima, Japan.

The man who found the phone mailed it back to Whitney, who said he was stunned to have his phone back, but glad because it was full of photos he had wanted to keep.