Can an iPhone be force started before the 15 minute recharge period? There are times when the iPhone is at low battery level that it turns itself off.

Sometimes, it maybe when I am going to charge it but looking for where my cable is, it turned itself off.

So I wonder, if I missed it by 20 seconds, how come sometimes I had to wait 15 minutes or even 18 minutes of recharging before I can start up the iPhone again, say, just to look at my email to see what flight number it is.

So if I had plugged in 20 seconds earlier, I might be able to use it continuously, for as long as I want, vs now I have to wait 15 minutes.  It is no issue if I am at home, but it matters more if I am at the airport trying to look up some info or to find a hotel due to flight cancelation due to weather.

So is there a way to charge it for 3 or 5 minutes, and force start the iPhone instead?
Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a way. As far as I know it charges to around 4-5% of battery capacity so that it's sure to be able to perform the whole boot process, even if it's unplugged, so not to screw something up when losing power while starting up the OS.
15-18 minutes seems long to me, though. It's usually 5-7 minutes using the iPhone charger.
Are you charging off a PC USB port?