Waymo on Tuesday said that it would update software used to operate its self-driving vehicles and improve its emergency response protocols after its robotaxis stalled in parts of San Francisco on Saturday due to a widespread power outage that snarled traffic and gridlocked parts of the city.
Waymo paused services on Saturday evening following a fire at a PG&E substation that knocked out power to about one-third of the city, affecting about 130,000 residents and forcing some businesses to close temporarily.
Videos posted on social media showed Waymo robotaxis stuck at intersections with their hazard lights on as traffic lights stopped working due to the outage.
Photo: Bloomberg
Waymo said its self-driving vehicles are designed to handle dark traffic signals at four-way stops, but they might occasionally request a confirmation check.
“While we successfully traversed more than 7,000 dark signals on Saturday, the outage created a concentrated spike in these requests,” Waymo said. “This created a backlog that, in some cases, led to response delays contributing to congestion on already-overwhelmed streets.”
Waymo said the confirmation protocols made sense during early deployment, but it is refining them to match the company’s current scale.
Waymo is implementing fleet-wide updates that provide vehicles with “specific power outage context, allowing it to navigate more decisively.”
Waymo also said it would improve its emergency response protocols by incorporating lessons from this event.
Waymo, which has a fleet of more than 2,500 vehicles operating in the bay area of San Francisco; Los Angeles; Metro Phoenix, Arizona; Austin, Texas; and Atlanta, Georgia, said it resumed its ride-hailing service in the San Francisco bay area on Sunday.
On Monday, the California Public Utilities Commission said that it was reviewing the issue of stalled Waymo vehicles.
The commission, along with the California Department of Motor Vehicles, regulates and issues permits for testing and commercial deployment of robotaxis.
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