A Waymo autonomous taxi led to a traffic jam at a busy fast-food drive-thru in Santa Monica on Monday night.
Clips aired by KTLA reveal an autonomous car getting stuck at the drive-thru entry of Chick-fil-A, leading to a longer queue than usual for awaiting patrons.
Around 9:30 p.m., an incident occurred at a Chick-fil-A located on Lincoln Boulevard, as reported by Chris Kellogg, one of the individuals awaiting the autonomous vehicle to navigate itself back into operation on the road.
His footage depicted Chick-fil-A employees gathered near the immobile car with its warning lights activated prior to it reversing forcefully for a moment and halting once more.
Kellogg mentioned that he had been waiting in line for approximately thirty minutes when he was informed the restaurant, which operates solely as a drive-thru, was closed.
Even though Waymo’s self-driving taxis are still a work in progress, they were previously introduced into urban environments a few years back. However, these vehicles sometimes got lost or disoriented. Getting diverted to a fast-food joint, not to mention queuing up at the drive-thru lane, remains quite an unexpected occurrence.
It remains uncertain whether there were people inside the vehicle at the moment or if the taxi was dispatched to the Chick-fil-A location because of an ongoing ride—or perhaps even due to some fictional scenario where the car gained sentience and needed organic material for energy. However, Waymo has confirmed to KTLA that the vehicle encountered difficulties and their team retrieved it from the scene.
A representative stated that the firm, which operates as a subsidiary under Google’s parent organization, remains "dedicated to consistently enhancing our services and implementing necessary modifications to ensure this issue does not recur."
KTLA contacted Chick-fil-A’s headquarters, where a representative stated that the drive-thru briefly closed to ensure the secure extraction of the vehicle. However, during this period, their walk-up window continued to serve customers without interruption.
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