A malfunctioning Waymo left a passenger stuck in the autonomous vehicle as it drove circles around a parking lot

• Tech entrepreneur Mike Johns got stuck in a wayward Waymo while headed to the airport last month.
• The malfunctioning autonomous car drove in loops around a parking lot for several minutes.
• A Waymo spokesperson told BI the problem has since been addressed by a software update.

Mike Johns was on his way to the airport last month when he decided to try something he'd only done once before: take a Waymo.

However, as soon as the autonomous vehicle picked him up, Johns told Business Insider he knew something was amiss.

"When I got in, the car went in a circle," Johns said. "At first, it was no big deal —  I figured it was gonna turn or do something — but, by circle number two, that's when I'm feeling like it's a prank."

The Waymo Johns ordered on December 9 to take him to the Scottsdale, Arizona airport back home to Los Angeles then looped around the parking lot again and again.

Johns, an AI consultant and the founder and CEO of the brand strategy agency Digital Mind State recorded the incident and his call with customer service on his phone. He posted about the experience on LinkedIn, writing: "My Waymo experience sucked."

"By lap number four, I knew this ain't a prank — and because the circle was going around this little island, I felt the nausea, the dizziness, start to happen," Johns told Business Insider. "That's the part that I really didn't like. And at that point, you know, I started to think 'What the hell's going on?'"

A Waymo spokesperson told Business Insider the incident delayed Johns' trip by a little over five minutes and that the looping issue was addressed by a regularly scheduled software update. It's unclear when the update was issued.

The spokesperson, however, declined to answer questions about how often such malfunctions are reported or about Waymo's procedure for identifying and fixing problems before they impact passengers.

Johns ultimately made it safely to the airport and to his flight on time after the Waymo got back on track. He did not have to pay for the trip.

A history of wayward Waymos

It's not the first time a Waymo has maneuvered itself in unexpected — and unwanted — ways. Passengers have regularly reported incidents since Waymo, a subsidiary of Alphabet, launched its driverless taxi service to the public in 2020.

In 2021, a self-driving Waymo went rogue and blocked traffic in Arizona in an incident a YouTuber documented from the backseat, BI previously reported.

In 2023, a traffic jam made up of a dozen Waymo vehicles caused gridlock in Phoenix. A software glitch was to blame, The Arizona Mirror reported.

And last September, a stalled Waymo blocked Vice President Kamala Harris' motorcade, per The San Francisco Standard.

The behavior of Waymo's driverless cars has also made headlines for baffling first responders at emergency scenes, blocking public transit, and refusing to pull over for police.

"In that moment, it feels almost like a hijack. That was the longest seven minutes — especially when you're not expecting it," Johns said. "It's a really crazy feeling because it's already when you're in an autonomous vehicle. It's this ghost in the machine scenario."

A lack of liability

While troubling, Johns has not indicated any plans to pursue legal action. Even if he did, Los Angeles personal attorney Jordan Peagler told BI that it's unlikely Johns has any legal recourse over the incident.

"He likely signed an arbitration agreement as part of the user terms of service so he won't be able to sue," Peagler said.

The Waymo terms of service include limitations of liability and an indemnification clause that protects the company "from and against any loss, liability, claim, demand, damages, expenses or costs" arising from users' experience with the service.

Moreover, Waymo does not "represent or warrant that our Services or servers are free of viruses or other harmful components. You assume the entire risk as to the quality and performance of the Services," the terms state.

Technically, Johns could have a personal injury claim if he missed his flight and had to incur additional expenses or for physical suffering if he became nauseous, Peagler said. However, "it would be so trivial that no attorney would pursue it."

Peagler added that self-driving rideshare vehicles are such a new and developing field that there is no set standard for personal injury yet. Moreover, he said that a malfunction would have to substantially impair the vehicle's operation to rise to the level of negligence.

Johns said by publicizing his experience, he isn't looking to stop Waymos from accepting passengers, but he does want the company to be more transparent about these types of malfunctions and the technology's limitations.

The Waymo terms of service do not, at the time of publication, warn of potential vehicle malfunctions or any risks of using the driverless technology.

"It's a new world that we've never known before and autonomous vehicles are ushering in a new economy," Johns said. "And I'm super all for it, but the big thing that we have to be aware of is the fact that we're all a part of the experiment — and we're paying to be a part of the experiment."