General Motors’ driverless-car unit Cruise is confronting a new safety investigation by federal regulators, after reports of its autonomous vehicles exhibiting risky behavior around pedestrians.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said in a Tuesday filing that it had opened a safety-defect probe into nearly 600 driverless cars operated by Cruise, adding that they might not be exercising appropriate caution in crosswalks and roadways.
NHTSA says it is aware of four incidents, including two that resulted in injuries, and it has launched the investigation to determine the scope and severity of the potential problem.
The probe represents the latest challenge for the San-Francisco-based Cruise, which is majority owned by GM, as the driverless-car firm tries to expand services in the Bay Area, Austin, Texas and Phoenix.
A Cruise spokesperson said the company regularly communicates with the NHTSA and is cooperating with its requests for information.
Among the reports NHTSA is investigating is one earlier this month in which a woman was severely injured in a hit-and-run crash in San Francisco. She was struck by a vehicle, whose driver later fled the scene, and then launched into the path of a driverless Cruise car, according to a video footage taken by Cruise.
The Cruise vehicle, which was operating in autonomous mode and had no passengers, came to a stop on top of the pedestrian. Rescue crews had to lift the car off the woman, who was then transported to the hospital, according to the San Francisco Fire Department.
Cruise said it has been actively working with police to help identify the responsible driver, and it had no additional information to share Tuesday. It briefed NHTSA on the incident and showed the agency video footage of it.
NHTSA is also investigating other reports of Cruise vehicles encroaching on pedestrians present in or entering roadways, including crosswalks, the agency said in the filing. Such scenarios could increase the risk of a pedestrian collision, which could result in severe injury or death.
This is the second defects investigation that NHTSA has opened on Cruise vehicles in less than a year. In December 2022, it opened a probe into about 240 Cruise driverless cars, after receiving reports of the vehicles braking hard or stalling while operating on public roads.
The agency said at the time it was aware of three crashes, which included two injuries.
Cruise said it is still awaiting NHTSA’s conclusion of that probe, noting a recent government audit found the agency often failed to complete its safety investigations in a timely manner.
The driverless-car service is also facing regulatory pressure from state officials with the California Department of Motor Vehicles in August initiating its own investigation into incidents involving Cruise vehicles in San Francisco.
The California DMV regulates self-driving cars in the state, including issuing permits for their operation, and said it reserves the right following its investigation to suspend or revoke privileges if it determines the cars pose an unreasonable risk to public safety.
Cruise, meanwhile, has agreed to reduce its fleet in half while the DMV’s probe continues, and it would have no more than 50 driverless vehicles operating in the day and 150 at night.
While other car companies have largely pulled back on their autonomous-car ambitions, GM has pushed ahead, aiming to expand Cruise’s driverless-taxi services to several U.S. cities.
In addition to San Francisco, it now offers rides in Phoenix and Austin, and as of July, was providing 10,000 trips a week.
Cruise uses GM’s Chevrolet Bolt electric vehicles equipped with autonomous gear. It has begun testing in several cities a larger, people-mover vehicle, the Cruise Origin, which has no steering wheel or other manual controls.
GM executives have highlighted the growth potential of Cruise, which it acquired in early 2016 for about $1 billion. As Cruise expands services, charging drivers for rides, its revenue could hit $1 billion by 2025 and $50 billion by the end of the decade.
Still, its rollout has hit some setbacks with it originally targeting 2019 as the timeline to offer fully driverless taxi service. That date was pushed back by several years, as Cruise and other driverless-car developers grappled with technical and regulatory hurdles.
Cruise’s expanding presence in San Francisco has also unnerved some residents in the tech-forward city.
Public officials there have raised safety concerns about the driverless cars and say the vehicles sometimes interfere with first responder operations, public transit, street construction workers and the flow of traffic.