Waymo pauses robotaxis in five US cities after cars drive into flooded roads

Waymo has now paused its self-driving car service in five US cities, in response to a software issue which has seen some vehicles enter flooded roads and get stuck.

The US firm recently issued a recall of thousands of robotaxis following an incident on 20 April in San Antonio, Texas when an empty Waymo vehicle entered a flooded road and was swept into a creek.

Following a similar incident in Atlanta, Georgia, a Waymo spokesperson said it had expanded the temporary pause to five cities - four in Texas as well as Atlanta - "out of an abundance of caution".

The company told Reuters it had also suspended services on US freeways as it works to improve its cars' performances in construction zones.

The company, which hopes to operate a robotaxi service in London later this year, told the BBC safety was its "highest priority".

"We continue to closely monitor forecasts, alerts, and live weather conditions, and we will resume serving riders soon," it said.

The software problem, which could allow vehicles "to slow and then drive into standing water on higher speed roadways" was highlighted in a letter posted on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration website earlier this month.

In response, Waymo issued a voluntary recall of nearly 3,800 of its robotaxis that use the company's fifth and sixth-generation automated driving systems, and said it was working on "additional software safeguards".

On Wednesday an unoccupied Waymo robotaxi was reported trapped in flood water on a road in Atlanta.

Meanwhile, the firm has temporarily pulled its service on freeways in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Miami, and said it was evaluating its cars' performance in construction zones.

In a statement given to Reuters, the company said it expected to resume those routes soon.

Waymo is owned by Google's parent company Alphabet, and says it provides more than 500,000 trips per week across multiple US cities including San Francisco, Austin and Miami.

Over the past year, several incidents with driverless cars have raised concerns over their safety.

In December 2025, a large power outage in San Francisco led Waymo taxis to stop working around the city, causing significant disruption.

And in April, a mass Apollo Go robotaxi outage in the Chinese city of Wuhan caused at least a hundred self-driving cars to stop mid-traffic.