Waymo is issuing a voluntary package callback aft 1 of its driverless vehicles collided pinch a telephone rod successful Phoenix, Arizona, past month, nan institution said. The conveyance was damaged, but nary passengers aliases bystanders were wounded successful nan incident.
The institution is filing nan callback pinch nan National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) aft completing a package update to 672 vehicles — nan full number of driverless-capable vehicles successful Waymo’s fleet. The update corrects an correction successful nan package that “assigned a debased harm score” to nan telephone pole, and updates its representation to relationship for nan difficult roadworthy separator successful nan alleyway that was not antecedently included.
This is Waymo’s 2nd callback ever
This is Waymo’s 2nd callback ever, aft 2 insignificant collisions prompted a callback of 444 vehicles last February. And it comes astatine a clip of increased regulatory scrutiny of nan driverless conveyance industry, successful which national investigators are probing almost each nan awesome companies operating autonomous vehicles successful nan US.
The incident that prompted nan latest callback took spot connected May 21st successful Phoenix. According to section reports, an unoccupied Waymo conveyance was driving to a rider pickup location done an alley that was lined connected some sides by woody telephone poles. The poles were not up connected a curb but level pinch nan roadworthy and surrounded pinch longitudinal yellowish striping to specify nan viable way for vehicles. As it was pulling over, nan Waymo conveyance struck 1 of nan poles astatine a velocity of 8mph, sustaining immoderate damage, nan institution said.
Image: 12News
The rider who was waiting for nan conveyance didn’t witnesser nan clang but did callback proceeding it. “It ne'er made it to prime america up,” Jericka Mitchell told 12News.
Waymo’s callback isn’t a callback successful nan accepted sense. It’s not taking its vehicles disconnected nan roadworthy for repairs aliases maintenance. Much for illustration Tesla’s package recalls, nan institution tin simply push an over-the-air update to each nan affected vehicles and past proceed to run connected nationalist roads aft nan caller package and maps person loaded.
“We person already deployed mapping and package updates crossed our full fleet”
“We person already deployed mapping and package updates crossed our full fleet, and this does not effect our existent operations,” Waymo spokesperson Katherine Barna said successful a statement. “As we service much riders successful much cities, we will proceed our information first approach, moving to gain spot pinch our riders, organization members, regulators, and policymakers.”
Waymo is trying to beryllium proactive astir its information — particularly arsenic it relates to incidents successful which its ain vehicles are intelligibly astatine fault. The institution is under investigation by NHTSA for complete 2 twelve incidents involving its driverless vehicles, including respective “single-party” crashes and imaginable postulation rule violations. Several incidents progressive crashes pinch stationary objects, overmuch for illustration nan May 21st clang pinch nan telephone poll.
A number of pedestrians and different bystanders person been injured by driverless vehicles, resulting successful much regulatory scrutiny and nationalist ire. Meanwhile, nan authorities is requiring more information from companies than ever before, particularly astir crashes, successful bid to find whether nan industry’s information claims unrecorded up to their hype. And nan companies are uncovering that nan proliferation of smartphones pinch cameras is moving against them, arsenic much videos of their vehicles behaving unpredictably aliases dangerously go viral.