In what seems to be one of the biggest recall announcements ever to come from BMW, the German company’s US arm announced today that it will be recalling around one million cars in the near future for two issues that may lead to an increased potential fire risk. Initially, the recall will be rolled out in the US only while the manufacturer is pondering whether it should be expanded to other countries around the world as well.

Continue Reading Below

According the a spokesperson from BMW USA, one recall covers about 670,000 BMW 3 Series models built between 2006 and 2011 (E90) and concerns a wiring issue for the heating and air conditioning system. This wiring can apparently overheat and therefore increase the risk of a fire. The second batch concerns 740,000 cars built between 2007 and 2011. This time, the affected vehicles are more diverse, from some 128i models to certain 3 Series, 5 Series, X3, X5 and Z4 models.

bmw E90 3 Series 1900x1200 05 750x500

This time too, the issue reported can apparently lead to a potential increase in a fire hazard. Apparently, a valve on the aforementioned cars can rust and lead to a fire but only in rare cases. Even so, BMW decided to recall all the cars affected and fix the issue, just to be safe. And while the two numbers added up may lead you to believe the figure is well above 1 million units affected, some of the cars overlap, having both issues.

Most of the cars are located in the US and the owners will be notified by BMW to bring in their cars to have them fixed. Some 15,000 of them are now in Canada and the same fix will be applied to them once the recall kicks off in December. Following this initial batch, BMW may extend the recall to other countries as well.