Yeah hopefully they weren't thrown out. The tape is probably wound tightly enough around the spools to not let water get in. Outside layer might be exposed to water but inner could be fine. Even if the plastic shell is hosed, the tape spools could be transplanted into a donor shell. Several of my tapes had mold on them and I took them apart and sprayed alcohol on them to clean the outer layers and edges. But inside was mostly fine. I also have a stack of hi-8 tapes, but decent camcorders are expensive so been holding off on those. Hopefully you can find and salvage them.
OXHD is coming along pretty well from what I can see. They have working boards. Here's a shot of one: https://x.com/OGX_Harcroft/status/1772763477519573003
I actually have an unpopulated OXHD board that I still need to build. My XboxHD+ works just fine, but I'd rather not be locked to Stellar or have to jump through hoops to make it work standalone. When my Stellar wasn't working for some reason, it was a very odd feeling not being able to use my Xbox because I couldn't get a video signal. XboxHD+ works well aside from that requirement and I don't mean to speak badly about it, it's just not a product that suits my particular needs.