The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said on Thursday local time that it had sent an inquiry to Alphabet's self-driving company Waymo, requesting further clarification on its alleged repeated illegal passing of parked school buses in Texas. The Austin Independent School District in Texas revealed that since the start of this school year, it has recorded 19 related incidents, all involving self-driving vehicles operated by Waymo.
NHTSA launched a defect investigation in October into a similar incident in Georgia, when a Waymo vehicle failed to remain stationary as required when approaching a school bus with a red light on and a stop sign extended. In a subsequent letter to NHTSA on November 20, the Austin School District stated that even though Waymo claimed to have solved the problem through a software update, five new incidents occurred this month, and formally requested that the company stop operating self-driving vehicles around schools during pick-up and drop-off periods until it can ensure that the vehicles no longer violate relevant laws.
Lawyers for the school district said in the letter that Waymo cannot be allowed to continue to endanger student safety while "trying to fix the problem," citing one incident in which a Waymo vehicle drove past a stopped school bus while a student had just crossed in front of it and was still in the driveway. This stance prompted NHTSA to ask Waymo on November 24 whether it would comply with the request to cease operations, whether it had implemented or developed appropriate software fixes, and whether it planned to initiate a recall process for such fixes.
The Austin School District told Reuters on Thursday that Waymo refused to suspend operations around schools, and a subsequent incident involving a school bus and self-driving vehicles that were loading and unloading students on December 1 showed that relevant procedural changes have not eliminated problems and concerns. In the statement, Waymo did not directly respond to why it did not suspend operations around Austin schools, nor did it indicate whether it would initiate a recall. It only stated that the company "attach[s] great importance to safe interactions with school buses" and has quickly implemented software updates and will continue to rapidly improve the system.
In a letter to Waymo on Wednesday, NHTSA asked the company to provide detailed explanations of all incidents involving school buses and its software updates to address safety hazards by January 20 next year. This inquiry is renewed pressure from U.S. regulators on the safety of self-driving technology, especially its performance in child riding scenarios, and may bring new uncertainty to Waymo's business operations prospects in Texas and other regions.