People Drive Into Flood Waters All The Time
Waymo’s Self-Driving Car Saw the Flood and Drove In Anyway. Here’s The Problem Plaguing Every Robotaxi. - Yanko Design
https://www.yankodesign.com/2026/05/15/waymos-self-driving-car-saw-the-flood-and-drove-in-anyway-heres-the-problem-plaguing-every-robotaxi/
Every sensor on a Waymo robotaxi sees the world in layers. The LiDAR maps it in three dimensions, radar bounces through it, and cameras read it in color and contrast, building a composite picture of the road that no human retina could match at the same fidelity. So when a Waymo encountered a flooded section
Filed May 16, 2026 at 8:39 am
Unless you've been living under a rock, you have seen more than a few videos of people driving into flooded streets and getting stuck. I've come to expect it. So why are se so surprised with a self-driving car, trained on human data does the same thing?
Here is one thing I believe is true about the difference. I think humans will continue driving into flooded waters. I'd bet money that they'll figure out how to make self-driving cars stop.