
Waymo disengagement report - just_saying_it
https://medium.com/waymo/the-worlds-longest-and-toughest-ongoing-driving-test-44464867865b
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phsource
It seems like Waymo's hitting a point of diminishing returns. The past 4
years' worth of disengagements per 1,000 miles driven were:

\- 2014 (last 3 months): 1.27 [1]

\- 2015: 0.80 [2]

\- 2016: 0.20 [2]

\- 2017: 0.18 [3]

There are two possible causes off the top of my mind:

1\. Waymo's cars are being tested in more demanding environments.

2\. There's a floor to the number of disengagements due to technology and road
conditions: situations that are different/unique enough that no model could
accurately detect/respond to it.

Case 2 would be definitely be a problem for the full-autonomous (i.e. zero
user-input) type of car. I'd love to hear other hypotheses/feedback from those
closer to this kind of work!

Also, another interesting note: total miles driven on public roads is actually
down from 2016 (352k vs. 636k earlier). Perhaps Waymo's finding the
simulated/private-road tests more fruitful for winnowing down the final edge
cases.

[1]
[https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/connect/dff67186-70dd-4042...](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/connect/dff67186-70dd-4042-bc8c-d7b2a9904665/google_disengagement_report.pdf?MOD=AJPERES)

[2]
[https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/connect/946b3502-c959-4e3b...](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/connect/946b3502-c959-4e3b-b119-91319c27788f/GoogleAutoWaymo_disengage_report_2016.pdf?MOD=AJPERES)

[3]
[https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/connect/42aff875-7ab1-4115...](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/connect/42aff875-7ab1-4115-a72a-97f6f24b23cc/Waymofull.pdf?MOD=AJPERES)

~~~
Animats
Waymo is doing a lot more testing outside California now. They've done
Mountain View so thoroughly they were seeing the same situations over and
over. Last year, they were rear-ended twice at the same intersection.

One disengagement every 5000 miles is a problem. It's too infrequent for
humans to remain attentive, and too frequent to ignore.

~~~
toomuchtodo
The “Autopilot Valley”.

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Animats
Here are all the CA DMV disengagement reports, not just Waymo's.[1]

Cruise is doing a lot of autonomous driving in SF.

[1]
[https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/detail/vr/autonomous/disen...](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/dmv/detail/vr/autonomous/disengagement_report_2017)

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phaemon
There isn't much to this blog post. The actual report is at:
[https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/connect/42aff875-7ab1-4115...](https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/wcm/connect/42aff875-7ab1-4115-a72a-97f6f24b23cc/Waymofull.pdf?MOD=AJPERES)

