Mob Sets Waymo Driverless Car Ablaze In San Francisco's Chinatown

(RTTNews) - Vandals set ablaze a driverless car operated by Waymo, the autonomous driving unit of Alphabet Inc., (GOOG), on Saturday evening in Chinatown, the San Francisco police department said.

"At approximately 9pm on Saturday, 10 February, a fully autonomous Waymo vehicle was navigating on Jackson Street in San Francisco when a crowd surrounded and vandalised the vehicle, breaking the window and throwing a firework inside, which set the vehicle on fire," a spokesperson of the company said.

The police said that around 10 to 15 members were involved in the incident. However, no arrests had been made as of Sunday.

The spokesperson for the Mountain View-based company stated that, "The vehicle was not transporting any riders and no injuries have been reported."

The vandalism incident could be seen as a protest against driverless cars in San Francisco, as it is the only other city than California in the U.S. to permit such cars on public roads.

Earlier this month, an autonomous car had hit a cyclist, causing minor injuries, at an intersection. A spokesperson of Waymo reasoned that, "The cyclist was occluded by the truck and quickly followed behind it, crossing into the Waymo vehicle's path."

According to the Department of Motor Vehicles or DMV data, so far nine vehicle collisions by self-driving cars were reported in California this year.

The DMV of California had already banned another driverless car company, Cruise, from operating robotaxis as the city officials blamed the technology for accidents.