Waymo robotaxis stalled during San Francisco power outage
Waymo robotaxis stalled during a San Francisco power outage affecting 130,000 customers, causing traffic congestion when vehicles requested confirmation checks at dark traffic signals. The California Public Utilities Commission opened an inquiry into the incident, and Waymo announced system updates to handle similar outages more effectively.
What happened
During a power outage on Saturday that affected approximately 130,000 Pacific Gas & Electric customers in San Francisco, Waymo robotaxis stalled at intersections and along busy streets. Videos shared on social media showed at least five driverless vehicles bunched together at a junction.
Waymo said its autonomous vehicles behaved as designed when intersections went dark, treating them as four-way stops. The vehicles requested confirmation checks when encountering dark traffic signals, but the concentrated spike in requests created a backlog leading to response delays that contributed to congestion on already-overwhelmed streets.
Reported impact
The robotaxis caused traffic jams throughout San Francisco, with vehicles appearing unable to function without traffic signals. Waymo suspended its ride-hailing service at 8 p.m. Saturday after the power outage began, at the request of city officials to keep streets clear for first responders.
Index analysis
Waymo established its confirmation check protocol during early deployment out of an abundance of caution, and it was effective during smaller outages. The company said its strategy was not designed to handle the scale of requests generated by the widespread outage affecting more than 7,000 dark signals.
Governance controls
Waymo announced it is implementing fleet-wide updates to provide vehicles with specific power outage context to navigate more decisively. The company said it would also improve emergency response protocols and expand engagement with first responders.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.