Water damage

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It's hard to say. If the Mac was closed, I'm not sure how the water ended up sitting on the keyboard. And I'm wondering if any of it got down inside through the little holes to the side of the keyboard.

In general, water is one of the more innocuous things that you can spill on your Mac. On the other hand, you never want to put power to any electronic circuitry that is wet. It could destroy it.

The best thing to do is to get it to an Apple authorized repairperson who can open it up and assess the damage. Had it not been powered up, there would be a fair chance that it could dry out and work again. There may still be a chance of that, but it is far more iffy since it had power put to it. Water will leave traces, and a competent repair person should be able to see just where it went and what might be affected.

If it has not been obviously destroyed, then it should be allowed to dry for a very long time before power is put to it again. The repair person should know how long.

But whatever you do, don't put power to it again. Something similar happened to my niece's MBP. Someone spilled a glass of water on it while it was on, and the water went into the left of the keyboard where the left I/O Board is. It shut itself off, and she left it shut off for a week in Santa Fe, where it is very arid, and let it dry. Even so, we took it to an Apple Store to get an Apple authorized guy to look at it first. He inspected it and turned it on. It worked, and has had no issues since.

So there is at least a little hope. No guarantees, but it might be possible to save it. But do take it in to someone for evaluation.

In the meantime, remove the battery and lay it down with the keyboard resting on a towel to allow any water a chance of getting out the way it went in.

Good luck!

Kind of off-topic, but relative to your story...

My basement flooded after a 10" rainfall. I had a fax machine, copier, stereo gear, a computer, etc., sitting on the floor in over two inches of water. After everything was cleaned up, I plugged in all of those devices and turned them on to see if they were working (Yeah, i know...real bright!)...

Anyway, nothing worked. After several days, we decided it was time to dump everything and start cleaning up. For kicks and grins, I decided to try everything one more time...Unbelievably, it all worked, and still works to this day...two years later! It just needed to dry out for a few days...

Hopefully, you'll have similar luck! I wish you well...

Blessings,

Craig

One crazy, but it works way to dry up any moisture that made be in the computer is to turn on an oven and let it heat to around 150 degrees F, turn off the oven, and with the display open and the battery out, put the computer in and partially close the door. This is a scary method, but 15 - 20 minutes in a warm but not hot oven can really dry out the machine.

Or, if you live someplace warm around this time of the year you can do the same thing by leaving the computer, with battery out and display open, in a car for a few hours.

I have fixed way too many water logged electronic this way. The other option is to just leave the laptop, with the battery out and display open, alone for a few days to allow the water to evaporate.

If the machine is covered under Apple care, call them first to see if you can talk them into fixing it. That's the slowest way, but it does work.