Photos in My Photo Stream remain saved in iCloud for 30 days. That should be sufficient time to back up your photos manually. After that, they are removed from iCloud. No matter how many photos My Photo Stream uploads to the cloud, the local Photo Stream album on any iOS or iPadOS device only keeps up to 1,000 images.
When you call a dead phone does it ring?
Answer: A: With a dead battery it should not ring but it should go to voicemail directly.