Alphabet-owned autonomous vehicle developer Waymo has temporarily suspended commercial robotaxi operations in five U.S. cities and pulled service from major freeways across multiple markets, after a critical software bug left multiple unoccupied vehicles stranded in floodwaters, sparking fresh safety scrutiny for the nascent self-driving industry.
The series of operational changes began after an April 20 incident in San Antonio, Texas, where an empty Waymo robotaxi drove onto a flooded roadway and was swept into a nearby creek. A second identical incident was reported weeks later in Atlanta, Georgia, where another unoccupied vehicle became trapped in standing floodwater. In response to the two events, Waymo announced it would expand its initial pause on operations to include four Texas markets and Atlanta, framing the decision as a proactive precaution.
The underlying hazard was first publicly documented earlier this month in a filing posted to the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration website. The software flaw, as described in the filing, can lead vehicles to slow down before proceeding into standing water located on higher-speed roadways, increasing the risk of flooding-related breakdowns and stranding. Waymo has since issued a voluntary recall covering nearly 3,800 robotaxis equipped with its fifth- and sixth-generation autonomous driving systems, and the company says it is developing additional software safeguards to address the vulnerability.
Beyond the city-wide service pauses, Waymo has also temporarily suspended autonomous operations on U.S. freeways across its other core markets, including San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Miami. The company told Reuters the freeway suspension is intended to give engineering teams time to refine the vehicles’ performance in construction zones, a common challenge for autonomous mapping and navigation systems. Waymo has emphasized that safety remains its highest priority as it works toward launching the first commercial robotaxi service in London later this year, and it says it is continuously monitoring weather forecasts and real-time conditions to prepare for a return to service.
“We continue to closely monitor forecasts, alerts, and live weather conditions, and we will resume serving riders soon,” the company said in an official statement to the BBC.
Waymo currently operates the largest commercial robotaxi network in the world, delivering more than 500,000 passenger trips per week across active U.S. markets including San Francisco, Austin, and Miami. But the latest recall and service suspension come amid a growing string of high-profile autonomous vehicle incidents that have stoked public and regulatory concerns over the readiness of self-driving technology for mass deployment.
In December 2025, a major grid-wide power outage in San Francisco caused dozens of idle Waymo vehicles to stall across the city, disrupting downtown traffic for hours. Just this past April, a widespread service outage for Baidu’s Apollo Go robotaxi service in the Chinese city of Wuhan left more than 100 autonomous vehicles stranded mid-trip, blocking traffic across multiple busy urban corridors. Industry observers note that as self-driving networks expand into new geographic and climate regions, developers will face growing pressure to address edge-case hazards that have not been fully tested in real-world conditions.
Waymo has said it expects to resume service on paused routes and freeway corridors in the near future, once software updates have been fully tested and validated.