Waymo expands pause to four cities as robotaxis keep driving into floods

Source: TechCrunch

Service Pauses in Four Cities

Waymo has paused service in four cities because its robotaxis are struggling to deal with heavy rain and flooded roads, a problem that already prompted the company to issue a recall last week.

One of Waymo’s robotaxis was spotted driving through a flooded street in Atlanta, Georgia, on Wednesday before it got stuck for about an hour, according to local news reports. The vehicle was recovered and removed from the scene, Wayway told TechCrunch. Waymo says it paused service in Atlanta, just as it has in San Antonio, Texas, while it figures out a solution.

“Safety is Waymo’s top priority, both for our riders and everyone we share the road with. During a period of intense rain yesterday in Atlanta, an unoccupied Waymo vehicle encountered a flooded road and stopped,” the company said in a statement.

Waymo also halted service in Dallas and Houston because of severe weather across Texas this week, the company told Bloomberg News late Thursday.

Safety Recall and Flooding Issue

Waymo admitted that it hadn’t finished developing a “final remedy” for avoiding flooded areas when it issued its software recall last week. Instead, the company shipped an update to its fleet that placed “restrictions at times and in locations where there is an elevated risk of encountering a flooded, higher‑speed roadway,” according to documents released by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

Even with those precautions, a Waymo robotaxi entered a flooded intersection in Atlanta. Waymo told TechCrunch that the storm produced so much rainfall that flooding was occurring before the National Weather Service had issued a flash‑flood warning, watch, or advisory. The company said those alerts are part of a larger set of signals it relies on to prepare the vehicles for poor weather.

“NHTSA is aware of this incident, is in communication with Waymo, and will take appropriate action if necessary,” a spokesperson for the safety regulator told TechCrunch regarding the robotaxi that got stuck in Atlanta.

Previous Safety Issues

This is not the first time Waymo has struggled to quickly stamp out problematic behavior with its robotaxis. When people started noticing Waymo robotaxis illegally passing stopped school buses last year, the company shipped a fix that was supposed to address the issue — only for its fleet to continue making illegal maneuvers around school buses.

Waymo’s behavior around school buses is at the center of one of two sets of active investigations into the company.

Ongoing Investigations

Both the NHTSA and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) are looking into the school‑bus issue. Waymo has already produced a batch of documents for the NHTSA, all of which were redacted to the public. On May 15, the NHTSA sent a second document request to Waymo because the company’s initial response “necessitates that [NHTSA] receive further data and information.”

The other set of investigations involves a January 23 incident where a Waymo robotaxi crashed into a child in Santa Monica, California. Waymo said its robotaxi braked to around six miles per hour before striking the child, who suffered minor injuries.

This story has been updated with more information about how Waymo uses National Weather Service alerts and to include new service pauses in Houston and Dallas.