Weeks after one of its robotaxis struck and killed a beloved Mission District bodega cat, Waymo has confirmed that one of its cars also struck an unleashed dog in San Francisco.
The latest incident happened around 8 pm Sunday, as Mission Local first reported via this Reddit account, in the vicinity of Scott and Eddy streets in the Western Addition. A small, unleashed dog reportedly entered the roadway and the autonomous vehicle ran over it.
No updates about the condition of the dog, or if it survived, have been reported, and the dog's owner has not come forward publicly.
The Waymo rider, redditor braveNewWorldView, who was apparently in the car with their kids at the time, initially just posted to the Waymo subreddit saying, "Our Waymo just ran over a dog," and "Trying to call customer support. Called the police. Crowd is gathering not sure what to do."
The person later followed up to say that a representative from Waymo reached out to them the next morning to check on them, and said they had dispatched team members to look for the dog's owner and offer support for veterinary care.
But the rider makes a good point about how Waymo could improve their service and how their vehicles operate in such a situation:
Honestly I not sure a human driver would have avoided the dog either though I do know that [a] human would have responded differently to a "bump" followed by a car full of screaming people. I suggested a wellness check feature that would check on passengers should the car detect panic screaming.
The rider added that "it's going to be a while before my kids will be willing to try [Waymo] again," but said they were satisfied with how the company handled the situation.
They also said that acknowledging incidents like this, and the shortcomings of the robot cars, "is the only way for these services to learn from them."
That is, of course, cold comfort to the dog's owners, regardless of whether they shared fault by allowing the dog to be off-leash near an active city street.
The case, much like the incident involving KitKat the bodega cat on 16th Street in which the cat died, highlights the discomfort of having potentially dangerous machines on the roads and causing harm, when there is no human driver to blame afterward.
Supervisor Jackie Fielder, who represents the Mission District, held a rally in early November following the cat's death, and called for legislation to give cities more local control over how autonomous vehicle companies operate there.
"If I were the Waymo PR team, I would be hoping that this whole KitKat thing just dies and that's not happening," Fielder said at the time. "Waymo thinks that they can just sweep this under the rug and we will all forget, but here in Mission, we will never forget our sweet KitKat. We will always put community before tech oligarchs and California should do the same."
Previously: Waymo Confirms Vehicle's Role In Death of 16th Street Bodega Cat, as Mourning Continues
