zzdcar
Home
/
Reviews
/
Tech
/
Waymo Cars Don’t Work In Heavy Fog
Waymo Cars Don’t Work In Heavy Fog-July 2024
2024-02-19 EST 22:10:24

Image for article titled Waymo Cars Don’t Work In Heavy Fog

San Francisco is known for . The thick, low-hanging water vapor can make visibility tricky, especially behind the wheel. Now, it seems that driverless vehicles are running into the same problem — with five cars from Waymo’s fleet waylaid by heavy fog Tuesday morning.

Five Waymo autonomous vehicles gave up on traversing the San Francisco fog just before 6:00 am the morning of Tuesday, April 11, , deciding to pull over on the side of a residential street until conditions improved. Unfortunately, the five vehicles were clustered together, forming a roadblock that made a residential street impassable until the fog cleared.

Other drivers, unaware of the cars’ inhuman operation, tried in vain to get the crossovers to move. They flashed their headlights and tried to fit past the stopped Waymo vehicles, in a manner that sounds very West Coast. A New Yorker would have stood still and just laid on the horn for two, possibly three hours, or driven through someone’s yard to get around.

The Waymo cars reportedly resumed normal operation within a matter of minutes, but the disruption remained an inconvenience for San Francisco residents. The fog, a condition to which all SF natives are accustomed, had now halted their morning commutes in a way they couldn’t control — a fleet of robots, unaccustomed to the lowered visibility, had decided the weather was too bad.

The Waymo stoppage is the latest tale of automated vehicle testing interrupting the normal daily life of drivers. Of course, an AV won’t know how to navigate fog without ever experiencing it, but it seems like the kind of testing best done on a closed course — not narrow side streets.

After publication, Waymo reached out to Jalopnik with the following statement:

“Early Tuesday morning, multiple Waymo vehicles in San Francisco encountered very dense fog and determined they should pull over temporarily. After a brief stop, the vehicles autonomously cleared the area as the fog began to clear. We have software updates planned to improve our fog and parking performance to address such situations in the future.”

Comments
Welcome to zzdcar comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
Tech
GM Says It's Dropping Apple CarPlay And Android Auto Because They're Unsafe (Update)
GM Says It's Dropping Apple CarPlay And Android Auto Because They're Unsafe (Update)
GM is still dealing with the fallout of its decision to drop Apple CarPlay and Android Auto in favor of developing its own in-house system. In the last eight months, the company has had to deal with while still maintaining its in-house system will be “.” Since neither of...
Jul 21, 2025
Truck Fans Would Rather Wait For A Toyota Tacoma EV Than Buy A F-150 Lightning Or Cybertruck
Truck Fans Would Rather Wait For A Toyota Tacoma EV Than Buy A F-150 Lightning Or Cybertruck
fans are already cooling on despite more options on the market and news of upcoming models from the likes of Chevy and Ram. The and have yet to be released, while the has recently joined the and for sale in the U.S. And, yet, all of these current and...
Jul 21, 2025
Costco Will Sell The Chevy Blazer EV At A Discount To Go With Your Rotisserie Chicken
Costco Will Sell The Chevy Blazer EV At A Discount To Go With Your Rotisserie Chicken
knows that you keep coming back for the and Kirkland brand, but you can now also buy a cheaper at your local warehouse. Chevy notified its dealers that members are eligible for a $1,000 rebate on the through January 2, according to . The discount is part of ,...
Jul 21, 2025
Volkswagen EVs Can Now Power Your House For Two Days (Update)
Volkswagen EVs Can Now Power Your House For Two Days (Update)
Experts have said that one of the ways to speed up EV adoption is for them to support . The ability for owners to power their house off their car or from the grid is vital. Just nine EVs on the market currently support bidirectional charging, but now VW...
Jul 21, 2025
Danish Investors Dump Tesla Shares After Elon Musk Calls Strikes In Sweden 'Insane'
Danish Investors Dump Tesla Shares After Elon Musk Calls Strikes In Sweden 'Insane'
Danish pension fund PensionDanmark is dumping all of its stock and putting the U.S. EV maker on its exclusion list of the companies it chooses to invest in – or not. The fund is selling all of its shares due to Elon Musk’s refusal to enter into labor agreements...
Jul 21, 2025
Biden’s First EV Charging Station Goes Online After $7.5 Billion In American EV Investments
Biden’s First EV Charging Station Goes Online After $7.5 Billion In American EV Investments
Despite in investments for the development of in the , not a single charging station had gone live thanks to — until now. The first EV charger paid for by Biden’s Bipartisan deal has come online in Ohio, according to , which marks the operational start of what the...
Jul 21, 2025
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.zzdcar.com All Rights Reserved