(Credit: Waymo)
A Waymo rider in San Francisco experienced an attempted break-in on Sunday night when the driverless car stopped at a red light.
A man approached the vehicle and tried to open it, seemingly fiddling with the door handle, according to a video posted on Reddit. Unsuccessful, he knocks on the window to get the rider to open the door before brandishing what appears to be a knife, though a glare in the video obstructs the view of the object.
"I’m not sure it was a knife. Maybe it was a tool to break car windows," the rider says.
"The scariest part was that I felt a bit helpless without a driver that could have just floored the gas to get us out of the situation," the rider says. "Once the light turned green, the Waymo drove me home like usual."
The shocked rider called Waymo to notify them of the incident. The company's response was "very supportive" and included a check-in email the next morning and a call from a Waymo supervisor. They advised him to press an emergency button in the Waymo app next time, which would have triggered a 911 call, per Waymo's policy.
Some Redditors commented on the post with advice to "reach up and honk the horn" to spook the robber or to press a button to honk the horn in the Waymo app.
"I still think Waymo is great and definitely will continue using their service," the rider says.
Last month, another Waymo rider in San Francisco reported feeling unsafe when being catcalled while sitting inside the vehicle. City residents have also been kept up all night from incessant vehicle honking, though Waymo has since issued a fix. School crossing guards have also complained about needing to dodge Waymo vehicles, NBC Bay Area reports.
Autonomous ridesharing services have been a contentious issue in the city since they were approved in August 2023, including pushback from fire departments and other first responders who worry malfunctioning vehicles could block their path and risk public safety.
Waymo is live in San Francisco, Phoenix, and Los Angeles and has plans to expand to Austin and Atlanta next year. The Alphabet-owned service was valued above $45 billion this week, Bloomberg reports, following a recent funding round of $5.6 billion.
The company is continuing to refine its technology, including experimenting with the large language models made by Google (also Alphabet-owned), The Verge reports. "With every mile our autonomous vehicles drive, our AI models can learn and improve to make each trip safer and more reliable, while meeting the high standards of our safety-critical domain," Waymo says.
Tesla is seeking approval to operate its robotaxi service in California as early as next year.