Ukrainian soldier's M1 MacBook Air takes direct shrapnel hit, saving his life — screen cracked and letter 'K' missing but laptop remains functional

A Ukrainian soldier showed off his 2020 M1 MacBook Air after it got hit by shrapnel during the war in Ukraine. X user @lanevychs [machine translated] asked on the social media platform about the ballistic protection that the laptop offered, especially after his device was able to take a hit from a shell fragment and seemingly survived. Despite the damage, the laptop still continued to work, with the screen showing images in some sections. And although the projectile punctured the screen, it seems that the base and keyboard of the device stopped it from going clean through. The only keyboard casualty being the "K" key.

It’s unclear where the user is based in the country, but chances are that they are near to the conflict. It’s also likely not the first time that the MacBook Air took a hit, as @lanevychs said in the replies [machine translated] that he “recently replaced the matrix (probably the motherboard) on this laptop after an FPV strike.” The MacBook Air is arguably Apple’s thinnest laptop in its generation, with its tapered design giving it a thickness of just 0.16 inches near the edges. It is 0.63 inches at its thickest point, though, making it about 0.02 inches thicker than the 13-inch MacBook Pro. Even though this might be imperceptible to the average user, it’s apparently good enough to stop a shell fragment.

Apple uses aluminum alloy for the unibody chassis of its MacBook line-up due to its strength and durability while still being lightweight. Aside from that, it also doubles as a heatsink, which is especially crucial for the fanless MacBook Air models. But even though Cupertino chose this material for its scratch and dent resistance, it seemed that it was also good enough to stop shrapnel. Unfortunately, he also decried the cost of repair in the comments, saying that “the repair will cost as much as a new laptop.”

The battle-damaged laptop shows off Apple’s engineering prowess, where even shrapnel can damage isn’t enough to completely destroy it. Nevertheless, we do not recommend using it as body armor, as it likely won’t be strong enough to stop a direct hit from small arms fire.

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