Waymo Suspends Freeway Rides After Robotaxis Flee From Police and Enter Flooded Roadways

Waymo has suspended all freeway robotaxi rides across the United States as the company works to address growing safety concerns tied to construction zones and flooded roadways.

The temporary shutdown comes after a series of incidents involving the company’s autonomous vehicles, including reports of robotaxis entering floodwaters and at least one alarming freeway event involving construction barriers.

Before the suspension, Waymo offered freeway trips in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Miami. Street-level service in most markets remains active, but freeway operations have now been paused nationwide while the company updates its software.

“We have temporarily paused freeway operations, as we work to integrate recent technical learnings into our software and expect to resume these routes soon,” a Waymo spokesperson said.

While Waymo did not officially confirm a specific freeway incident triggered the decision, the timing closely follows a video posted to X earlier this week showing a Waymo robotaxi driving through a freeway construction zone before being pursued by police.

Waymo later confirmed it was evaluating and improving the system’s performance around certain types of construction areas.

Just saw death flash before my eyes in a @Waymo

I use these a lot on the city but tonight we took the freeway and the road was closed.

Waymo freaked out and sped up to highway speeds through construction trucks, police chased us.

Genuinely thought we were about to die.

— QuietLight (@Elliot_slade) May 19, 2026

The freeway suspension also arrives after the company issued a software recall affecting 3,791 robotaxis equipped with its 5th and 6th Generation Automated Driving Systems. According to filings with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the software could allow vehicles to slow down but still continue into flooded roadways on higher-speed streets.

That recall stemmed from an April 20 incident where an unoccupied Waymo vehicle encountered what the company described as an “untraversable flooded section” of roadway with a 40 mph speed limit. Although the robotaxi detected the standing water and reduced speed, it still proceeded into the flooded area instead of stopping completely.

Since then, additional flooding-related incidents have surfaced. In Atlanta this week, a Waymo robotaxi carrying a journalist drove into a flooded street and became stranded for nearly an hour before being removed. Separate incidents in Texas also forced Waymo to pause service in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Atlanta as severe weather moved through those regions.

One of the more serious events occurred in San Antonio last month, when a Waymo vehicle was reportedly swept away after entering floodwaters.

Waymo says it has already implemented temporary operational restrictions and updated mapping data to reduce the likelihood of encountering flooded higher-speed roads. However, the latest incidents suggest the challenge of handling rapidly changing real-world conditions remains a difficult problem for its autonomous driving systems.