US probes Waymo robotaxis over school bus safety (www.yahoo.com)

U.S. regulators have opened a preliminary probe into roughly 2,000 Waymo robotaxis after a media-released video showed one of the company’s vehicles failing to remain stopped for a school bus with red lights flashing and the stop arm deployed. NHTSA said the Waymo vehicle initially stopped, then maneuvered around the bus while students were disembarking; it was running Waymo’s fifth‑generation automated driving system (ADS) and had no human safety driver aboard. The agency flagged the investigation because Waymo’s fleet has logged over 100 million miles (about 2 million per week), increasing the likelihood of prior similar incidents. Waymo says it has already implemented improvements for school-bus behavior and will push further software updates. The case matters because school-bus interactions are high-stakes edge cases that test perception, occlusion handling, rule-following logic and conservative fail-safe behavior in autonomous systems. NHTSA’s action underscores growing regulatory scrutiny of how self-driving systems interact with pedestrians, cyclists and vulnerable road users; it follows a recently closed 14-month probe that led to two recalls after reports of unexpected maneuvers and minor collisions. Technically, the incident highlights challenges in detecting stop-arms and flashing lights from oblique approach angles, decision-making when signage is partially occluded, and the need for verified software patches or operational constraints to ensure legal and safe behavior around children.