As police and hearth officers responded to a drug lab explosion in San Francisco, they needed to deal with a driverless automobile that meandered into the center of the scene.

Physique-cam footage from February exhibits an officer yelling on the Waymo car and tossing a flare to maintain it from driving over hearth hoses.

A number of weeks earlier, a firefighter reported having to smash the window of a driverless car to make it cease approaching a hearth scene.

In March, firefighters mentioned that they had cordoned off a avenue to cope with wind harm, solely to have two Cruise autos drive by way of the warning tape and turn into entangled in downed wires.

“They’ve made each effort to work with us in public security measures and be a very good companion,” a hearth official informed Mission Native for a narrative revealed final week. “However they don’t have a very good product.”

First responders mentioned the issue of driverless autos by accident disrupting emergency scenes has gotten worse since firms have expanded their hours of testing. The story mentioned at the least 15 hearth division incident stories famous interference from Waymo or Cruise autos.

“Earlier than, you solely used to have this stuff working after 2 a.m,” one firefighter mentioned. “There’s not a lot visitors; you go round them. It was humorous then. Now they’re out within the daytime.”

Cruise informed Mission Native it has a “nice relationship” with the San Francisco Fireplace Division and is “continually bettering our expertise.” Waymo, in a prolonged assertion, mentioned: “Emergencies can occur at any time. Subsequently, we have taught our expertise easy methods to acknowledge and reply to emergency autos regardless of if it is midday or midnight.”