About 2 million Ford F-150 pickup trucks are being recalled due to an odd problem with seat-belt equipment.Some front seat passenger belt pretensioners “can generate excessive sparks when they deploy,” causing smoke or fire, Ford says in a press release. The second-largest U.S. automaker said it was aware of 17 reports of smoke or fire in the United States and six in Canada relating to belt pretensioners, but was not aware of any accidents or injuries as a result of this condition. You can see a pretensioner deploy in this video from The Slow Mo Guys:

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"Ford's investigation found that some front seat belt pretensioners can generate excessive sparks when they deploy," the company stated. The recall comes after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) opened a preliminary investigation in August into 1.6 million Ford trucks after five complaints of fires in the seat belt component, including three vehicles destroyed by fires. The recall covers 2015-2018 Ford F-150 Regular Cab and SuperCrew Cab vehicles in North America for driver and front passenger seat-belt pretensioners. The recall will be costly – as the AP reported, "Ford said in a filing Thursday with U.S. securities regulators that the recall will cost about $140 million and will be counted in third-quarter results." Instead, the automaker said that its dealers will "remove insulation material from the B-pillar trim, remove remnants of wiring harness tape in the B-pillar area, and apply heat-resistant tape to the carpet and its insulation" on crew cab and extended cab pickups.
Approximately two million Ford F150 trucks are recalled due to a manufacturing error which can cause the seat belt pretensioner to ignite the vehicle.