Waymo, the autonomous ride-hailing company that launched its services in Los Angeles late last year, is recalling more than 1,200 vehicles due to a software defect, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said Wednesday.
The recall comes after a series of minor crashes with gates, chains and other obstacles in the road that did not result in any injuries, the Mountain View, Calif.-based company said in a filing with the NHTSA. The recall applies to 1,212 driverless vehicles operating on Waymo’s fifth-generation automated driving software.
Waymo released a software update to resolve the issue, and that update has already been rolled out in all affected vehicles, the recall notice said.
The company operates more than 1,500 vehicles across Los Angeles, San Francisco, Phoenix and Austin. The recall does not affect any vehicles currently on the road, said Waymo spokesperson Ethan Teicher.
Self-driving vehicles have come under increased scrutiny following several issues with Tesla’s autonomous technology and a 2023 incident in which a pedestrian was seriously injured by a Cruise vehicle.
The NHTSA opened an investigation into Waymo in May 2024 after receiving reports of 22 incidents involving the fifth-generation software. The agency said several incidents under investigation “involved collisions with clearly visible objects that a competent driver would be expected to avoid.” The investigation remains open.
In February 2024, Waymo recalled 444 vehicles after two minor collisions in Arizona. Although incidents involving Waymo vehicles generate attention, the vehicles are safer than human drivers, according to data collected by insurer Swiss Re.
Based on data collected by Waymo, their driverless vehicles had 81% fewer airbag deployment crashes, 78% fewer injury-causing crashes and 62% fewer police-reported crashes than traditional vehicles driving the same distance. Waymo vehicles rely on cameras, sensors and a type of laser radar called lidar to operate autonomously.
“Waymo provides more than 250,000 paid trips every week in some of the most challenging driving environments in the U.S.,” Teicher said. “Our record of reducing injuries over tens of millions of fully autonomous miles driven shows our technology is making roads safer.”
Operated by Google’s parent company, Alphabet, Waymo put its first autonomous vehicle on the road in 2015. It launched its driverless ride-hailing service known as Waymo One in 2020, and has plans to expand to Atlanta, Miami and Washington, D.C., next year.
