Samsung has officially recalled 1 million of its Galaxy Note 7 phones sold before September 15 because of “serious fire and burn hazards”.
Advertisement
Consumers should immediately power down and stop using the recalled Galaxy Note 7 devices, the agency said.
Samsung notes that affected devices include Galaxy Note 7 phones sold before September 15th, 2016.
When the new phones come in, you’ll have to make a second trip to exchange your loaner for a new Galaxy Note 7 with safe replacement batteries.
In the meantime, the FAA told airline passengers to turn off the phones when flying due to the safety risk.
Up until now, Samsung was asking Galaxy Note 7 owners to return their devices via their voluntary replacement program, but only now has it been made official. Samsung had beaten Apple to market with the Note 7 by several weeks, and it was drawing favorable reviews before consumers began reporting problems with the battery overheating, resulting in fires and explosions.
The company sold around 400,000 of the devices before the recall and will have enough in stock by end of next week to replace all of them, a source familiar with the matter said. Go to www.samsung.com for more details. “The battery cell issue announced earlier this month is isolated to one battery manufacturer for one specific phone model”.
Sharon Cain, the eyewitness who recorded the above video of the blaze later posted to Facebook: “A vehicle caught fire from a charg (ing) Note Galaxy 7 on Crosstown (in) Port St. Lucie”. On Monday, Canada issued an official recall.
Samsung has embarked on a mammoth recall of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 globally.
The U.S. government on Thursday moved to recall Samsung’s highest-end smartphone – an unprecedented move for the smartphone industry and one that delivers a severe blow to Samsung in its pursuit to become the world’s premium smartphone maker.
Advertisement
“You have two different trajectories, with Samsung packing in more energy density, versus Apple trying to trim it down by optimizing everything else”, he said, adding that the two rivals are “constantly locked in this arms race of improving and one-upping”.
