Waymo says its robotaxi service has resumed after making “temporary adjustments” in San Francisco amid what appears to be a power outage approximately 7,000 PG&E customers affected in the city.
According to a screenshot posted on social mediaWaymo told SF customers that service was “temporarily interrupted” and that “highway routes are unavailable.”
When JS reached out to Alphabet’s corporate office for comment, a spokesperson said in a statement: “We are making temporary adjustments to our service while we monitor local conditions. We know passengers depend on us and we will return to normal operations as soon as possible.”
After the initial publication of this article, a Waymo spokesperson added that the company “decided to suspend service for approximately one hour to assess the extent of the outage affecting much of San Francisco and coordinate with local officials.”
Power outages have affected Waymo service in the past, such as when a number of Waymo vehicles became stranded on city streets during a power outage in December, and when a similar incident paralyzed traffic during a Fourth of July fireworks show on the Golden Gate Bridge.
As a result, San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie has called for stricter state regulations to “adequately address how autonomous vehicles operate during major incidents, planned or not.”
This post has been updated with additional comments from Waymo indicating that service has resumed.
