Waymo Robotaxis Stalled During SF Power Outage
San Francisco officials are demanding answers from Waymo after its autonomous vehicles stalled on city streets during a power outage in December. City leaders want to know more about the operational failures and what contingency plans are in place to prevent future gridlock caused by the robotaxi fleet.
The widespread power outage on December 20, 2025, stemmed from a fire at a PG&E substation, knocking out electricity to approximately 130,000 homes and businesses across San Francisco. This infrastructure failure disabled numerous traffic signals, creating a citywide stress test for autonomous vehicle systems. While Waymo's vehicles are programmed to treat dark intersections as four-way stops, the sheer scale of the outage created an unprecedented number of simultaneous "confirmation checks," where vehicles request remote assistance to ensure safety. This surge in requests overwhelmed the system, creating a backlog that led to response delays and stalled vehicles. The immobilized robotaxis contributed to significant traffic congestion, in some cases blocking intersections and impeding emergency vehicles responding to the substation fire. Following the disruption, Waymo temporarily suspended its service across the affected areas. Passengers inside some of the stalled vehicles were left stranded until they chose to exit and walk. In response to the incident, San Francisco Supervisor Bilal Mahmood called for an oversight hearing to get answers from Waymo about the technical failures. The California Public Utilities Commission also launched a review of the event. Waymo has acknowledged the system's shortcomings during the large-scale event and announced a three-part remediation plan. This includes fleet-wide software updates to provide vehicles with more context about regional outages, allowing them to navigate more decisively, alongside updated emergency response protocols and expanded first responder training.
