Officials in China say BMW is recalling more than 1.3 million vehicles that may have Takata airbag inflators following a similar recall in the U.S. last month.

Ford and Mazda are warning the owners of more than 475,000 older vehicles in the U.S. not to drive them because they have dangerous Takata air bag inflators that have not been replaced.

Nissan is urging the owners of about 84,000 older vehicles to stop driving them because their Takata air bag inflators are at high risk of exploding in a crash and hurling metal fragments.

Toyota is telling the owners of about 50,000 older Corolla, Corolla Matrix and RAV4 models to stop driving them because their Takata air bag inflators are at risk of exploding and hurling shrapnel.

U.S. auto safety regulators say they are monitoring data from a group of mostly unrecalled Takata air bag inflators after one of them exploded in a BMW and hurled metal fragments that seriously injured a driver in Chicago.

The U.S. government’s highway safety regulator has opened an investigation into a potential problem that surfaced last year with 56 million Takata airbags but that the agency eventually deemed safe based on industry research.

Despite years of urgent warnings, millions of defective and potentially explosive Takata airbags remain on U.S. roads, nearly a million in Texas. Drivers are urged to check their cars for recalls.

A driver in South Carolina is the latest person to be killed by an exploding Takata air bag inflator.

The company on Thursday issued two recalls, with the largest coming because Ford can't find 45 obsolete air bags that may have been installed on some old Ranger pickup trucks. The company says the air bags were not purged from the stock of service parts and could have been used in crash or theft repairs. In a smaller recall, Ford found just over 1,100 vehicles that may have gotten obsolete Takata air bags in collision repairs. Takata used the volatile chemical ammonium nitrate to create a small explosion to inflate the air bags in a crash. The air bags have caused at least 27 deaths worldwide, including 18 in the U.S. About 400 have been injured.

The U.S. government's highway safety agency has rejected a request from Ford and Mazda to avoid recalling about 3 million vehicles with potentially dangerous Takata air bag inflators. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya, file)DETROIT – The U.S. government's highway safety agency has rejected a request from Ford and Mazda to avoid recalling about 3 million vehicles with potentially dangerous Takata air bag inflators. The problem caused the largest series of auto recalls in U.S. history, with at least 67 million inflators recalled by 19 automakers. But the safety agency disagreed and denied the automakers’ petition to avoid the recall. The Ford and Mazda inflators are the earliest generation made by Takata that used calcium sulfate as a drying agent.

Honda is dumping longtime supplier Takata over its deadly airbags. Honda, one of Takata's biggest customers, also alleged Takata misrepresented and manipulated test data, and has requested the firm hire a third party to conduct an audit of test details given to Honda. Earlier on Wednesday, U.S. regulators slapped Takata with a massive $70 million fine for selling its botched inflators. Takata could be hit with an additional $130 million fine if it fails to adhere to safety measures going forward. Takata could face additional fines from a U.S. Justice Department investigation, and has been involved in multiple private legal actions.