Alphabet Unit Waymo Claims Lower Crash Rate Despite Regulator Probes Into Risky Driving Behavior: 'This Is Why We Do It'

Alphabet Inc. GOOG GOOGL subsidiary Waymo released a safety report on Tuesday pegging its autonomous driving technology as better than a human driver, resulting in fewer crashes that cause injuries or even police-reported crashes in San Francisco and Phoenix.

What Happened: Had a human driver covered the same 14.8 million miles that Waymo covered autonomously through the end of March, the individual would have caused more police-reported crashes and crashes involving an injury, the company said.

Waymo’s self-driving technology is 3.5 times better at avoiding crashes that cause injuries and two times better at avoiding police-reported crashes than human drivers, as per the company. In San Francisco alone, Waymo’s driving resulted in 17 fewer injuries and 12 fewer police-reported crashes, it added.

“This is why we do it, and what keeps us going. Safety and transparency go hand in hand at Waymo, and this latest data shows the real impact our technology is having in the communities we serve,” Waymo Chief Product Officer Saswat Panigrahi wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

Why It Matters: Waymo believes that autonomous driving can save lives by removing reliance on human drivers who can get drunk, tired, or distracted. It currently operates robotaxis in parts of San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Phoenix. The company also intends to expand services to Austin soon.

However, the U.S. auto safety regulator National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) commenced a probe into Waymo vehicles in May following reports of unexpected driving behaviors.

The regulator expressed concern that these driving behaviors may increase the risks of crash and injury. “Although this office is unaware of injury allegations, several of the incidents involved collisions with clearly visible objects that a competent driver would be expected to avoid,” the regulator wrote in a letter to Waymo dated May 23.

Only last week, Waymo recalled about 672 of its self-driving vehicles after identifying their inability to avoid a pole or pole-like objects. The company identified the issue after one of its self-driving cars collided with a wooden utility pole in an alleyway in Phoenix, Arizona late last month. The company fixed the issue with a software update to improve its reaction to pole-like objects and "robust" mapping updates and improvements.

Late last month, EV giant Tesla Inc. also released a vehicle safety report aimed at reaffirming the safety and lower crash rate of its driver assistance systems. Tesla is looking to achieve vehicle autonomy by improving its full self-driving (FSD) software to enable vehicles to operate without human intervention. 

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