in today’s Bulldog wrapup of technology and science news:

  • US regulators recall Samsung Galaxy 7 Note phones
  • Watch the Consumer Reports video about the story
  • Truckers warn against electronic speed controls
  • A Tesla crash in China is fatal
  • China launches a new space station

The details:

  • US regulators: Official recall of 1M Samsung Note 7 phones

U.S. regulators issued an official recall of Samsung’s Galaxy Note 7 phone on Thursday because of a risk of fire.

Samsung already has voluntary recalled the devices after a few dozen devices exploded or caught fire. That was out of about 2.5 million phones sold.

(VIDEO: Watch the Consumer Reports video report about the recall at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CR6iMPb0Gw )

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is stepping in on a formal recall. Its chairman, Elliot Kaye, blasted Samsung for trying to do the recall on its own, saying that anyone who believes that to be adequate “needs to have more than their phone checked.”

  • Truckers warn speed caps will cause crashes, jam highways

Truckers are warning that a government plan to electronically limit the speed of tractor-trailers will lead to highway traffic jams and possibly an increase in deadly run-ins with cars.

The government has proposed requiring electronic speed limiters on all trucks and buses over 26,000 pounds (11,794 kilograms) manufactured after the regulation goes into effect. Speeds could be limited to 60, 65 or 68 miles per hour (96.56, 104.6, or 109.43 kilometers per hour) when the rule is finalized after a comment period that ends Nov. 7.

Regulators and others favoring speed limiters say the rule is supported by simple physics: If trucks travel slower, the impact of a crash will be less severe and fewer people will be injured or killed. But truckers say the government is actually creating conditions for more collisions by focusing on the severity of the crash while ignoring the dynamic of trucks and cars traveling at different speeds.

  • Tesla’s Autopilot system under scrutiny in fatal China crash

Tesla faces new scrutiny in China about its vehicle Autopilot system after state television broadcast allegations that a man killed in a crash had activated the driver-assist feature of his car.

The state broadcaster CCTV aired a report Wednesday about a January crash that killed 23-year-old Gao Yaning. The report included apparent dash cam footage of the car slamming into a slow-moving orange truck.

An official interviewed in the report said the car’s Autopilot feature was active at the time of the crash. CCTV reported Gao’s family has sued Tesla in a Beijing court, though the lawsuit was not available in online court records. Officials at the court did not answer the phone on Thursday, a Chinese holiday.

  • China launches second space station, Tiangong 2

China has launched its second space station in a sign of the growing sophistication of its military-backed program that intends to send a mission to Mars in the coming years.

The Tiangong 2 was carried into space on Thursday night atop a Long March 7 rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on the edge of the Gobi Desert in northernChina.

Plans call for the launch next month of the Shenzhou 11 spaceship with two astronauts to dock with the station and remain on board for a month. The station, whose name means “Heavenly Palace,” is considered a stepping stone to a mission to Mars by the end of the decade.

The Tiangong 2 module will be used for “testing systems and processes for mid-termspace stays and refueling,” and will house experiments in medicine and various space-related technologies.

China’s first space station, Tiangong 1, was launched in September 2011 and officially went out of service earlier this year after having docked with three visiting spacecraft.