A big group of rowdy skate boarders in San Francisco mobbed a Google-owned Waymo self-driving vehicle on Saturday evening.
Video posted to Reddit exhibits a number of individuals soar on the automobile and spray-painting graffiti on it. A number of have been seen dancing on the automobile and one individual sat on the massive sensor atop the roof.
The car was not autonomous on the time of the incident, according to Motherboard.
A Waymo spokesperson stated the automobile was being operated by a driver who managed to soundly get out of the vandalized automobile earlier than it was swarmed.
“At roughly 10 pm on July 9, one in every of our automobiles working in guide mode in San Francisco was surrounded by people who jumped onto the hood, roof and the trunk of the automobile and vandalized the car with spray paint,” a Waymo spokesperson informed Motherboard.
“The autonomous specialist was ultimately capable of direct the automobile safely out of the group and take away themselves from the state of affairs. We’re in shut communication with the San Francisco Police Division as they actively examine this incident.”
The incident befell within the metropolis’s Mission District, the place a whole bunch of skate boarders gathered for the annual Dolores Hill Bomb.
The occasion entails skate boarders gathering and using down a steep hill. Afterwards, they maintain rowdy celebrations.
It’s unlikely that the skate boarders focused the automobile as a consequence of its affiliation with Waymo, in response to the report. Most definitely, the motive force stumbled upon the occasion by likelihood.
In March, Waymo began providing driverless rides to staff in San Francisco, accelerating a race with General Motors-backed rival Cruise to commercialize the expertise within the dense metropolis.
Waymo additionally launched autonomous rides to staff in downtown Phoenix with security drivers behind the wheel, with a objective to open it to public testing.
“Working absolutely autonomously in a number of markets — along with Waymo’s rising trucking operations — is a vital validator of the scalability of Waymo’s operations and expertise,” it stated in a press release.
A self-driving expertise pioneer, Waymo began the primary US driverless taxi service in 2020, over a decade after it was born in 2009 as a undertaking inside Google.
Whereas it provides paid rides to a whole bunch of individuals per week utilizing Chrysler minivans, Waymo’s service has not expanded past suburban Phoenix areas that cowl about 50 sq. miles.
Cruise already is giving absolutely driverless rides to staff and members of the general public freed from cost in San Francisco. The corporate is in search of CPUC approval for business driverless service, with a objective to get permitted this yr.
With Publish wires
