Waymo announced the recall of thousands of self-driving taxis because the vehicles may run into highway construction sections at high speeds. The self-driving company, which is part of Alphabet Group and a brother company to Google, has launched a recall for some of its vehicles equipped with fifth-generation self-driving systems. There have been many safety incidents before: vehicles failed to recognize ramp closure signs and drove straight into the planned highway construction area.
Currently, many companies are planning to accelerate the commercial operation of self-driving taxis in the United States.
A safety recall report issued by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration under the U.S. Department of Transportation shows that a total of 3,871 vehicles are involved in this recall. Officials stated that in certain scenarios, the self-driving vehicle would give priority to avoiding other dangerous road conditions on the highway, but failed to identify the construction area, and then drove into the construction section and maintained high speed, posing major safety risks.
This recall coincides with major companies accelerating the deployment of self-driving taxis in the United States. This week, Uber, Lucid Group and Newro announced plans to launch self-driving taxi services in Houston next year; Intel-owned Mellanox also said it plans to launch a new self-driving taxi service in 2027.
The recall report disclosed that after one related safety incident occurred in Phoenix, Arizona on April 11 and five on April 19, Waymo's on-site safety committee temporarily introduced highway driving restrictions until the company completed the optimization of operating rules and improved the vehicle's ability to identify high-speed road closure scenarios and respond to emergencies. On May 18, seven more Waymo vehicles appeared in the San Francisco Bay Area, passing between traffic cones and entering highway lanes that were still under construction. The Corporate Safety Committee officially decided to launch this large-scale recall on June 8 after verifying the operating data of many vehicles passing through construction sections.
The report pointed out that the recall and rectification plan includes three major contents: upgrading the vehicle software, on the one hand to avoid vehicles from entering the construction area from the source, on the other hand, accurately identifying vehicles that have entered the construction section in real time; and at the same time, adding a number of supporting operational safety management systems.