At the time of the May 21st accident, the Waymo vehicle went through an alley lined with telephone poles mounted at street level rather than on a curb, with a yellow line showing where to drive. While pulling over, it struck one of the poles at 8 MPH and sustained some damage, Waymo said.

"It never made it to pick us up," the passenger waiting for the car, Jericka Mitchell, told 12News. Mitchell reportedly heard, but didn't see the accident.

The company filed a recall with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) after updating the software in its entire self-driving fleet of 672 vehicles. The update is designed to fix an error that assigned a low damage score to the pole and failed to account for the alleyway's hard edge.

It's only Waymo's second recall. The first happened earlier this year when two of its autonomous vehicles crashed into the same pickup truck that was being towed. In that one, Waymo found that its software failed to predict the movements of the vehicle due to "persistent orientation mismatch" between the towed vehicle and the one towing it.

Waymo is also under investigation for more than 24 incidents including crashes and traffic violations. Rival Cruise, owned by GM, was involved in a more serious incident last year, wherein one of its robotaxis accidentally dragged someone hit by another vehicle a few dozen feet down a San Francisco street. California then suspended its license to operate in the state and Cruise eventually paused all robotaxi operations

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At the same time, yesterday Cruise released its own third-party findings regarding the accident, which took place on October 2 and involved another vehicle (a Nissan). The company said it "failed to live up to the justifiable expectations of regulators and the communities we serve… [and] also fell woefully short of our own expectations," adding that it's "fully cooperating" with investigators. According to its own findings, that's an understatement to say the least.

According to the report, Cruise withheld crucial information from officials during a briefing the day after the accident. Specifically, the company failed to mention that its autonomous vehicle (AV) had dragged the victim 20 feet at around 7 MPH, causing serious injuries. According to the internal report, that occurred because the vehicle mistakenly detected a side (rather than a frontal) collision and attempted to pull over rather than stopping.

At least 100 Cruise employees, including members of senior leadership, legal and others, were aware of the dragging incident — but failed to disclose it during October 3 meetings with the San Francisco Mayor's Office, NHTSA, DMV and other officials, the report states.

The company said it intended to let a video of the dragging incident speak for itself, then answer questions about it. However, the video didn't play clearly and fully due to internet connection issues, and then Cruise employees failed to verbally affirm the pullover maneuver and dragging of the pedestrian. In case that's not bad enough, the third-party findings state:

The report says the failings came about due to "poor leadership, mistakes in judgment, lack of coordination, an 'us versus them' mentality with regulators, and a fundamental misapprehension of Cruise’s obligations of accountability and transparency to the government and the public."

Prior to the crash, Cruise was facing other problems with its autonomous vehicles (AVs) failing to recognize children and the frequency with which human operators took control. According to former CEO Vogt, human drivers needed to intervene in trips every four to five miles.

Cruise had its license to operate suspended in California back in October. The company also laid off 24 percent of its workforce late last year, following the resignation of co-founder Daniel Kan and the departure of its CEO Kyle Vogt. On top of the two federal investigations, the company is also facing a lawsuit from the city of San Francisco.

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