Recent Waymo incidents spark controversy amongst students

Waymo’s autonomous vehicles have struck a cat and a dog within the span of a month

A Waymo stops to pick up a passenger in Union Square on Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025. (Paula Sibulo / Golden Gate Xpress)

On Sunday, around 8 p.m., a Waymo driverless taxi hit a small dog in the Western Addition neighborhood of San Francisco. This follows after an incident in late October, when Waymo hit and killed a tabby cat named Kit Kat on 16th Street.  

Owned by Google’s parent company Alphabet, Waymo has now hit two animals within the span of a month, sparking a nationwide controversy about autonomous vehicles. The health status of the dog hit on Sunday is currently unknown. 

“Unfortunately, a Waymo vehicle made contact with a small, unleashed dog in the roadway. We are dedicated to learning from this situation and how we show up for our community as we continue improving road safety in the cities we serve,” a Waymo spokesperson wrote in a statement.

Jordan Manzo, a San Francisco State University business marketing student, deleted his Waymo app after hearing about Kit Kat and did not like Waymo’s response to the incident. 

“What Waymo had to say about it is kind of insensitive because they’re like, ‘Well, these things are just gonna happen. People just have to deal with it,’” Manzo said. That’s what’s causing so much outrage, especially with people who live here in San Francisco.”

Manzo’s friend, Alejandro Garcia, also deactivated his Waymo account and sent an email to the company explaining his boycott. 

“I just said that I was uncomfortable until they switched the way that they respond to incidents such as that,” Garcia said. “It was not very human, not humane, the way they answered. And they could have took a way different approach to satisfy their customers.”

Megan Current, a political science student, said if Waymo reacts to pedestrians, they should be reacting to pets as well, but she’s not surprised at the news. 

“Lots of non-autonomous vehicles do hit pets, so I’m kind of curious about the rate,” Current said. 

According to Waymo, their autonomous vehicles have 91% fewer serious injuries or worse crashes, 79% fewer airbag deployments and 80% fewer injury-causing accidents compared to the average human driver.

With Waymo’s autonomous taxis posing competition to Uber and Lyft drivers, Current prefers not to use Waymo. 

“Why would I pay a robot to do something when my money could go to a human?” Current said.

Apparel and design student Liliann Yang said Waymo causes more harm than good. Yang began boycotting Waymo after hearing about Kit Kat’s death.  

“Honestly, I think they should just cancel all Waymos because there’s malfunctions with them,” Yang said. “They stop in the middle of the road. They’re causing more traffic jams.”

Some students think Waymo is not at fault. Computer science student Jacob Robles pointed the finger at the pet owner, noting that the dog struck on Sunday was off-leash.

“They got to keep up on a leash or something,” Robles said. “Obviously, animals don’t really know, so it’s a responsibility on the owners.”

Alex Naber, a computer science student, thinks the two incidents were caused by a technical malfunction.

“Maybe a bug or something tweaked out for it not to recognize that there was a cat or dog on the road,” Naber said. “Is this problem easily identifiable and easily fixed? Or is this a bigger issue that’s going to keep happening over and over again?”

Even after these events, Naber said he would not take Waymo unless potential technical issues are addressed. 

“I still would want to see change first before I get into a Waymo again,” Naber said. “I would like to hear from the engineers what exactly what was wrong and how they fixed it.”