SF supervisors grill Waymo over 1,593 robotaxi stops in the blackout

Previously

In Part 1, a PG&E substation fire cut power to much of the city. Waymo's cars, built to treat dark signals as four-way stops, requested remote confirmation in a surge that created a backlog. Waymo paused service and promised a software update.

SAN FRANCISCO, March 2026 — City supervisors questioned Waymo about the December blackout on March 2. Here's what changed since Part 1 (December 2025), what it cost, and what went wrong.

Cost and outcome (as of March 3, 2026)

Stoppages: 1,593 stops of two minutes or more by 829 vehicles between noon and 11 p.m. on Dec. 20, more than 96% resolved autonomously, per Waymo's Jan. 30, 2026 filing with the California Public Utilities Commission. (CPUC filing, R.25-08-013)
Manual retrievals: "at least 63" (SFCTA) or 64 (SF Standard), with first responders handling at least two.
Emergency impact: at least three Waymos hindered emergency services, delaying an ambulance 40 minutes and blocking firefighters at two fires. (SFCTA)
Dispatcher calls: 31, one kept on hold 53 minutes. (SF Standard)
Remote operator ratio: declined to disclose. (SFCTA)

What's changed

The hearing, before the Board of Supervisors' Land Use and Transportation Committee, was called by Supervisor Bilal Mahmood and co-sponsored by Supervisor Alan Wong, the SFCTA said. Committee Chair Myrna Melgar presided, with Supervisor Chen also taking part.

Waymo's count of stalled cars had been withheld before. The Chronicle reported that a judge had scolded the company's attorneys for refusing to disclose it during the CPUC's rulemaking (R.25-08-013), claiming it was a trade secret. In its Jan. 30 filing in that rulemaking, Waymo said 829 of its vehicles operated in the outage area between noon and 11 p.m. on Dec. 20 and logged 1,593 stops of two minutes or more. More than 96% ended with the car driving on autonomously; the rest needed manual retrieval. Waymo said not all were at dark signals.

"We acknowledge today, again, that we did not meet our standards during the outage," said Michael Magee, Waymo's public policy manager, according to the Standard. He acknowledged Waymo did not proactively contact the city. Mayor Daniel Lurie texted Waymo's co-CEO when the power went out but at first received only emoji replies, the Standard reported.

The city's case

Mary Ellen Carroll, executive director of the Department of Emergency Management, said first responders were "becoming a default roadside assistance for these vehicles, which we do not think is tenable," the Standard reported. Wong said: "The theme I'm hearing is our first responders should not be AAA roadside assistants," according to the Chronicle.

Mahmood cited AB 1777, the state law on AV interactions with first responders. "The gulf between the 30 seconds that the law requires and the 50 minutes that we heard about today is massive," he said, KQED reported. KQED also reported that remote assistance operators work in countries "as far away as the Philippines." "If we're reliant in an emergency situation on operators in the Philippines to have to assess the condition here, how can you explain or justify that?" Mahmood asked.

"Frankly, what I'm hearing mostly is that you kind of still expect our first responders to do roadside assistance, and you are just going to help us train them better to do that," Mahmood said, according to the Standard. Melgar raised concerns about how the fleet might handle an earthquake, the Chronicle reported.

Waymo's response

A Waymo spokesperson said after the hearing that the company has 70 remote assistance operators, who cannot drive the cars remotely, the Standard reported. Spokesperson Sam Cooper said Waymo has trained 1,000 San Francisco first responders to take over its cars, but said the status quo is "not acceptable." Waymo also blamed PG&E for inaccurate restoration times. Asked how much it would need to increase remote operator staffing to avoid another backlog, Magee demurred, the Standard reported. The SFCTA said Waymo representatives also declined to say how long disabled vehicles obstructed traffic, or when the company's operational capacity would be increased. It has rolled out fleet-wide updates and put incident managers on call during major events, including the Super Bowl, the Chronicle reported.

What went wrong

First responders as tow crews. City staff retrieved cars during an emergency.
Slow hotline. One dispatcher waited 53 minutes.
Withheld data. Waymo declined to give its operator-to-fleet ratio or how long cars blocked traffic.
What we don't know yet: how many more remote operators Waymo will add, and whether the city will set binding rules.

Our follow-up question for Waymo

How many remote assistance operators per vehicle will Waymo staff during citywide emergencies?

Later developments (added Oct. 2026)

As of Oct. 25, 2026, we found no published follow-up from the committee setting new requirements for Waymo. The SFCTA said it is working with the Contra Costa Transportation Authority on emergency coordination protocols under a federal Safe Streets for All grant. (SFCTA)

Sources

San Francisco County Transportation Authority, “San Francisco Board of Supervisors Hold Hearing on Waymo Operations During December 2025 Blackout,” March 2, 2026. sfcta.org
San Francisco Chronicle, Rachel Swan, “Here's how many times Waymo robotaxis stalled during S.F.'s December blackout,” March 2, 2026. sfchronicle.com
The San Francisco Standard, Garrett Leahy, “Supervisors grill Waymo about 1,500 stalled cars during December blackout,” March 3, 2026. sfstandard.com
KQED, “Is Waymo Ready for Another Emergency? San Francisco Supervisors Are Skeptical,” March 3, 2026. kqed.org
Waymo, “Autonomously navigating the real world: lessons from the PG&E outage,” Dec. 23, 2025. waymo.com
Waymo LLC, “Response of Waymo LLC on the January 12, 2026 Administrative Law Judge's E-Mail Ruling,” CPUC Rulemaking R.25-08-013, filed Jan. 30, 2026. docs.cpuc.ca.gov

Disclosure: [not in copy] Editor placeholder