How do I fix corrupted iCloud backup from water damaged iPad Pro?

Greetings,

I’m in a difficult situation and need help with restoring the iCloud backup of my water-damaged 4th Gen iPad Pro (128GB) to my 5th Gen iPad Pro (256GB). The backup is about 40GB in size, and I’ve been stuck for quite some time trying to restore it, with no progress.

Here’s the full story:

My 4th Gen iPad Pro had a crack in one of the corners near the power switch and volume buttons (top-right). Unfortunately, it sustained liquid damage when a bowl of hot soup spilled on it. The screen flashed purple and then turned completely black while I was watching a video. The audio kept playing for a moment, but then it stopped entirely. The iPad was lying flat on the table.

I took the device to a repair shop in hopes they could restore it, but they informed me that the motherboard was severely damaged. They explained that they could only transfer the data to a new device via a device-to-device transfer, but unfortunately, that process didn’t work. I attempted the transfer three times over the course of 4 hours, but each attempt failed with the error: “Unable to complete data transfer, the connection to your iPad was lost. Reset iPad to start setting up again.” Both devices were left undisturbed on a table side by side, with no movement or interruptions during the transfer.

After these failed attempts, the shop recommended I try restoring from an iCloud backup. I upgraded to the 2TB iCloud storage option and allowed the old iPad to back up. Once the backup completed, I reset my 5th Gen iPad Pro and attempted to restore the 40GB backup.

However, I encountered more issues. Initially, the restore process got stuck during the “Time estimating” phase. After about 30 minutes, the time estimate finally appeared and started at 7 hours. I followed the advice to leave it for a few hours, but it only got worse. The next day, the “Time remaining” jumped to 22 hours. I called the repair shop to update them on the situation, and by the end of the call, the time had escalated to 1 day.

I left the iPad to restore overnight, but when I checked the next morning, it was still stuck at “Time remaining: 1 day.” I reset the iPad again, but after another full day, the restore progress still hadn’t moved forward. It’s now been 2 full days, and the process is still stuck at “Time remaining: 1 day.”

At this point, I’m wondering if the iCloud backup from my damaged device may have been corrupted during the backup process, especially since the device was already damaged when the backup was made. Could the corruption of the device have impacted the integrity of the backup itself? Has anyone experienced something similar, or does anyone have suggestions on how to resolve this issue?

Any help or insights would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you in advance for your time and assistance.

[Re-Titled by Moderator]