That is why I hammered the point to use Google Drive or Dropbox or for-the-love-of-god-anything to my friends at Uni. It really, really sucks when it happens to you, but I feel it's something that must happen to everyone once before they learn the lesson. As for the drive, what actually has happened with it? You might be able to take it to a data recovery firm, in some cases with traditional HDDs it's as simple as replacing the controller chip with one from the same model; I have no idea if that would be possible for a SSD however. Backups are to become mandatory weekly.
it's a pay service, but I've heard nothing but good things about Backblaze for off-site backup.
I don't know what exactly happened to it. It's probably in the report that the repair service has made afterwards... which I forgot to take with the receipt... Whoops. I stay hopeful, though. If there's a chance of recovery, I'll see if I can apply for it. The SSD contained, among other things not in the backup drive, a few of the web projects that I may not be able to recreate (or that will take a lot of time to recreate with any precision). It also had all the latest music I've accumulated. I hope it can be repaired.