Federal safety investigators are taking a second look at Waymo's software fix for robotaxis that drove past stopped school buses. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration opened a recall inquiry covering 2,895 vehicles equipped with Waymo's fifth-generation automated driving system. The agency says most of the reported incidents occurred after Waymo said it had finished installing the fix in November 2025.
The case opened Nov. 6 and concerns the effectiveness of an existing recall. The filing announces no new recall or service suspension. The agency is investigating why vehicles kept passing buses after the software change. Its new case summary lists eight traffic citations supplied by the Austin school district under outside reports. The table also lists confidential manufacturer information, so the eight citations are a public entry in the file rather than a complete incident count.
What Waymo changed in 2025
In its December 2025 recall filing, Waymo described a specific sequence. A vehicle could slow down or stop for a school bus with flashing red lights or an extended stop arm, then move before the signals cleared. The first event Waymo identified that matched that behavior happened on Sept. 22, 2025. Its vehicle slowed to 5 mph and continued before the arm went back in.
Waymo said it rolled out the software change from Nov. 5 through Nov. 17, 2025, and filed the recall on Dec. 10. That filing listed 3,067 potentially affected vehicles, all owned by Waymo and already updated. The new inquiry lists 2,895 vehicles. The documents describe two different agency actions and give no explanation for the difference between the two counts.
The agency's earlier evaluation began in October 2025 after a reported incident in Atlanta. NHTSA closed that evaluation on the same day it opened the new case. The focus shifted from identifying the behavior to testing the adequacy of Waymo's fix and investigating the incidents that followed it.
What happened on an Austin school route
A separate investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board offers a close look at one of those later incidents. On Jan. 12, 2026, a Waymo Jaguar I-Pace traveling in the opposite direction stopped for an Austin Independent School District bus on East Oltorf Street. The school bus was picking up students, with its red lights flashing and both stop arms extended.
The empty robotaxi asked a remote assistance agent whether it was seeing a school bus with active signals. The agent replied that it was not. The vehicle moved again and passed the bus while the arms were still out. The NTSB counted six vehicles that passed the stopped bus, including the Waymo. There was no crash. The board is also looking at similar Austin school-bus incidents, including one two days later on a special-needs route.
Under Texas law, drivers approaching a school bus from either direction generally have to stop when its visual signals are active. A separate roadway can qualify for an exception. A center turn lane alone does not, and the NTSB describes this part of East Oltorf as an undivided road.
What the two investigations can establish
NHTSA is examining whether the remedy worked across the fleet it identified. The NTSB is examining what happened in Austin and can issue safety recommendations. Its Austin account is preliminary. It documents the exchange with the remote agent and the car's movement, but the board has yet to issue a finding on probable cause.
Waymo has expanded service in several US cities since the original recall. The November filing gives families and school districts a more specific question to track as service grows: whether the same behavior can recur after a car initially recognizes a school bus and stops. NHTSA has assigned the case number RQ26006.
