Thousands of recalled Samsung washing machines still in use and pose 'urgent' fire danger.

More than 80,000 faulty Samsung washing machines with the potential to spark fires are still in use two years after they were first recalled.

Today, the technology giant launched another national safety recall of the top loader machines through a large advertising campaign.

A total of 144,450 machines were found to be faulty in 2013 but only about 61,000 have been serviced or replaced since the initial recall.

Since then, 180 incidents have occurred where the machines have been smoking, overheating and catching fire, with two occurring as recently as last week in New South Wales.

Samsung vice-president of consumer electronics Phil Newton said he wanted Australians to remain safe.

“Our responsibility and our desire is the safety of Australians, it’s our number one priority and we won’t rest until every single one of these has been taken care of and dealt with,” he told the ABC.

Mr Newton said he followed the advice of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) when the company was made aware of the fault.

“We spent millions in advertising to try and drive awareness,” Mr Newtown said.

“I guess people just lead really busy lives and for lots of different reasons, people don’t check these details.”

Mr Newton said the campaign launched today targeted the remaining 83,000 machines still in use across Australia and it was rolled out across metropolitan and regional media as well as Facebook and Twitter.

NSW fair trading commissioner Rod Stowe said the department supported Samsung’s efforts and reiterated that the machines still posed a real danger.

“There has been several fires here in New South Wales, some in recent weeks … this is not a theoretical problem, this is a very urgent issue that people need to attend to,” Mr Stowe said.

“We’re urging consumers with Samsung washing machines to check the model number and their appliance and to contact Samsung if it’s one of the six affected by the national recall.”

Customers who own a Samsung top loader washing machine can check if their model is affected here.

Samsung said the models would be reworked, replaced or refunded completely.

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This post originally appeared on ABC News.

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