A power outage in San Francisco earlier this month caused multiple Waymo robotaxis to stall and contribute to traffic disruption, renewing debate over how autonomous fleets should perform during large-scale emergencies. The incident occurred after a fire at a PG&E substation knocked out power to roughly a third of the city, and videos showed vehicles stopped at intersections as traffic signals went dark.
Waymo said its cars are designed to treat non-functioning signals like four-way stops, but the outage triggered a surge in “confirmation” requests that delayed responses and added to congestion. Regulators in California said they are looking into the incident, while experts have urged clearer standards for remote assistance (teleoperation) and emergency-response readiness as robotaxi fleets expand.
Why it matters: Robotaxis are scaling in more cities, and outages, earthquakes, or major disruptions test whether remote-support systems can keep up when many vehicles need help at once.
Source: Reuters report on the incident
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