A Waymo robotaxi was vandalized after which set on fireplace by a crowd of individuals Saturday night in San Francisco’s Chinatown neighborhood. The incident is the most recent encounter between driverless automobiles and the general public in San Francisco, a metropolis the place autonomous car corporations have spent years testing the know-how on public streets.
The Saturday night time incident, which was captured on video and shared on social media channels, didn’t look like a coordinated effort. As an alternative, the video reveals a crowd turning into more and more riled up and violent as soon as the driverless car turns into surrounded.
A Waymo spokesperson confirmed that there have been no passengers within the driverless car on the time. The corporate’s assertion:
At roughly 9 PM on Saturday, February tenth, a completely autonomous Waymo car was navigating by way of San Francisco when a crowd surrounded and vandalized the car, breaking the window and throwing a firework inside, which set the car on fireplace. The car was not transporting any riders and no accidents have been reported. We’re working intently with native security officers to answer the state of affairs.
This isn’t the primary time San Francisco residents have messed with a driverless car. And it possible received’t be the final.
Final summer time, a decentralized group of secure streets activists in San Francisco disabled robotaxis all through town by placing a traffic cone on a car’s hood.
The “Week of Cone,” because the group referred to as the viral prank on Twitter and TikTok, was a type of protest in opposition to the unfold of robotaxi providers within the metropolis. The protest got here forward of a California Public Utilities Fee listening to, wherein Cruise and Waymo obtained the ultimate allow required to commercially function robotaxi providers in San Francisco.
There have additionally been movies depicting folks attacking Cruise robotaxis. However with Cruise currently suspended from working within the metropolis, Waymo is the one driverless robotaxi service — and essentially the most seen image of autonomous tech within the metropolis.
