Feds say Waymo's fix for robotaxis passing stopped school buses didn't work
NHTSA has opened a new investigation after finding that most reported incidents of Waymo cars illegally passing stopped school buses happened after the company's supposed software fix.
What happened: The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has opened a new investigation into Waymo, asking whether a software fix the company issued last November actually stopped its robotaxis from illegally passing stopped school buses. NHTSA says in a November 6 filing that most of the reported incidents happened after that fix was supposedly completed. This builds on an original probe opened in October 2025 after an Atlanta robotaxi drove around a bus with its stop arm out and lights flashing while children were unloading.
Why it matters: Passing a stopped school bus with its red lights on is illegal in all 50 states because it's one of the few moments drivers are guaranteed children may be crossing unpredictably. Waymo told regulators and the public it had fixed the problem with a software update finished November 17, 2025, followed by a formal recall in mid-December. The government says that timeline doesn't match the incident reports: a January case documented by the NTSB and other events in Austin came well after the fix was supposedly in place.
How it works, plainly: Self-driving systems have to recognize a stopped bus, its extended stop arm, and flashing lights as a hard-stop signal distinct from ordinary stopped traffic, then hold position until the bus moves. Waymo's cars apparently kept misreading or mishandling that scenario even after an update meant to fix it. Austin's school district even set up a staged data-collection session with real buses and stop-arm signals to help train Waymo's software, but incidents reportedly continued afterward.
The rollout: NHTSA's Office of Defects Investigation has opened what's called a recall query, a formal step to check whether Waymo's remedy was adequate. The NTSB is separately investigating. Waymo says it has made real improvements and has had no citations for this issue since March 2026, and says it will cooperate with the new inquiry. Past recall queries of this kind have sometimes ended in civil penalties running into tens of millions of dollars.