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Image Credits:Brandon Bell / Getty Images7:24 AM PST · November 9, 2026
Nearly a twelvemonth ago, Waymo updated its self-driving bundle and issued a callback aft galore reports that its robotaxis were illegally passing schoolhouse buses that had stopped and deployed flashing reddish lights. Now, national information regulators person opened a caller probe into wherefore that behaviour has continued.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said successful a November 6 filing that a bulk of these reported incidents occurred aft the institution deployed a bundle update intended to hole the problem.
Reuters was the first to report the filing.
Waymo said past twelvemonth that a software update was completed for each affected vehicles connected November 17, 2025. However, NHTSA said the bulk of the incidents occurred aft the bundle update. NHTSA’s Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) has opened a “recall query” to “assess the adequacy of the remedy.”
The ODI opened its archetypal probe into Waymo successful October 2025 aft seeing footage of 1 of its autonomous vehicles maneuvering astir a stopped schoolhouse autobus that had its halt motion extended, lights flashing, and was unloading children successful Atlanta. In that incident, a Waymo robotaxi crossed perpendicularly successful beforehand of the schoolhouse autobus from its close side. The autonomous conveyance past turned near astir the beforehand of the autobus earlier traveling down the street.
Numerous different incidents person been documented successful the weeks and months since successful Austin, wherever Waymo besides operates a robotaxi service. Austin Independent School District officials reported astatine slightest 5 specified incidents astatine the time, according to a letter filed with NHTSA.
TechCrunch has reached retired to Waymo and Austin Independent School District officials for remark and volition update the nonfiction if they respond.
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Kirsten Korosec is simply a newsman and exertion who has covered the aboriginal of proscription from EVs and autonomous vehicles to municipality aerial mobility and in-car tech for much than a decade. She is presently the proscription exertion astatine TechCrunch and co-host of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast. She is besides co-founder and co-host of the podcast, “The Autonocast.” She antecedently wrote for Fortune, The Verge, Bloomberg, MIT Technology Review and CBS Interactive.
You tin interaction oregon verify outreach from Kirsten by emailing [email protected] oregon via encrypted connection astatine kkorosec.07 connected Signal.
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