A Waymo self-driving taxi recently struck a child near a Santa Monica elementary school during drop-off hours, triggering an investigation into the incident by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The child sustained minor injuries, Waymo said. After being struck, the child stood up and walked to the sidewalk, where witnesses called 911.
Santa Monica Police said officers responded to the Jan. 23 incident near 24th and Pearl streets, close to Grant Elementary School. After being evaluated by responders from the fire department, the child was released.
The investigation said the child was running across the street toward the school when they were hit. Waymo said the child appeared from behind a large SUV.
“The event occurred when the pedestrian suddenly entered the roadway from behind a tall SUV, moving directly into our vehicle’s path,” Waymo said in a statement. “The Waymo Driver braked hard, reducing speed from approximately 17 mph to under 6 mph before contact was made.”
There were other children, a crossing guard and several double-parked vehicles in the vicinity when the accident occurred, according to NHTSA.
Waymo reported the incident to the NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation and said it would fully cooperate. The Waymo involved was operating on the company’s fifth-generation automated driving system without a safety driver.
The company said the incident demonstrated the safety benefits of Waymo.
“Our peer-reviewed model shows that a fully attentive human driver in this same situation would have made contact with the pedestrian at approximately 14 mph,” the statement said. “This significant reduction in impact speed and severity is a demonstration of the material safety benefit of the Waymo Driver.”
A spokesperson for the city of Santa Monica referred questions to police.
Santa Monica sued Waymo in December after it ordered the company to cease overnight operations of two charging stations for the autonomous vehicles. Waymo in turn sued the city, alleging that city officials were aware the charging facilities would be operating 24 hours a day and maintain a commercial electric vehicle fleet.
The Alphabet-owned company also came under fire late last year for running over and killing KitKat, a beloved neighborhood cat in San Francisco. Weeks later another Waymo hit an unleashed dog in the city.
Video evidence shows that KitKat lingered under the vehicle for several seconds before it pulled away, crushing him. A woman was crouched beside the car, trying to lure KitKat to safety. A human driver easily would have noticed something wasn’t right, critics said.
Waymo has been the subject of several NHTSA investigations and recalls, including a recall of more than 1,200 vehicles last year because of a software defect that led to a series of minor crashes.
Waymo launched its services in Los Angeles in 2024 and covers more than 120 square miles of the county, not including Los Angeles International Airport. The company got its start as the Google Self-Driving Car Project, which began in 2009 and put its first autonomous car on the road in 2015. The project rebranded as Waymo in 2016 under Google’s parent company and launched its driverless ride-hailing service known as Waymo One in 2020.
