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https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a69093599/waymo-federal-investigation-driving-around-stopped-school-bus/

Waymo Under Federal Investigation for Driving Around Stopped School Bus

One of the first rules taught in any competent driver's education course is that school buses are sacred. Stopping for the extended arm is burned into our collective driving instincts ... but the same behavior is not so instinctual for self-driving cars.

That's why autonomous vehicle startup Waymo is currently under a federal probe, according to a new announcement by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The investigation, which was officially opened on October 17, claims that the autonomous rideshare service's vehicle may have a pattern of failing to yield to the school buses, specifically citing an incident in which a Waymo ignored a school bus that was stopped with its red lights flashing, stop sign out, and crossing control arm deployed.

"In the incident, the Waymo AV approached the right side of the stopped school bus from a perpendicular side street. The AV initially stopped, but then drove around the front of the bus by briefly turning right to avoid running into the bus’s right front end, then turning left to pass in front of the bus, and then turning further left and driving down the roadway past the entire left side of the bus," the investigation announcement reads.

This specific incident, which has been reported on by other media outlets, was enough to spark the federal investigation. Waymo confirmed that the rideshare vehicle was operating with its proprietary fifth generation automated driving system during the incident and there was no safety operator present. NHTSA documents claim that Waymo's autonomous driving services clock over two million miles a week across the country, leading investigators to believe "the likelihood of other prior similar incidents is high."

A Waymo spokesperson told Reuters that the company has already developed and implemented fixes to this school bus yielding problem, and is planning to add additional software updates in their next release. The California-based operator added that "driving safely around children has always been one of Waymo's highest priorities," and claimed that the angle of the turn in the incident prevented the vehicle from identifying the school bus properly.

"In the event referenced, the vehicle approached the school bus from an angle where the flashing lights and stop sign were not visible and drove slowly around the front of the bus before driving past it, keeping a safe distance from children," Waymo told Reuters.

With 1500 vehicles operating in cities across the country including San Francisco and Phoenix, Waymo is one of the most respected autonomous vehicle operators, particularly given its combination of camera- and lidar-based operating and safety systems. Next steps for federal investigators will include understanding how Waymo programs its vehicles to behave around school buses and if the system is strict in its abilities to follow traffic safety laws. And for the record, Alphabet-owned Waymo isn't alone in having the feds cast an eye its way; this investigation comes after a series of probes have been opened into Tesla's Autopilot and Full Self-Driving semi-autonomous systems.