Angry Arizonians have spent the past year attacking Waymo’s self-driving cars, which are being tested in a city outside of Phoenix, in protest of the ever-increasing reach of artificial intelligence, according to a Monday report from The New York Times. Some have slashed tires, others have thrown rocks or tried to run the cars off the road—but in total, the Times reports, nearly two dozen Waymo vehicles have been attacked by locals in Chandler, Arizona, in the past two years. “There are other places they can test,” one resident—who received a warning from police after allegedly trying to run Waymo vehicles off the road—told the paper. His wife, who also allegedly joined in on the attacks, noted that the couple’s 10-year-old was nearly struck by a self-driving car. “They said they need real-world examples, but I don’t want to be their real-world mistake,” the man added. That wouldn’t be the first “real-world mistake” in the area, the Times notes—much of the animosity from Chandler’s residents comes from the fact that a self-driving Uber hit and killed a woman in Arizona this March. Waymo drivers told the Times that the company has been reluctant to prosecute the attacks on their cars for fear of interrupting testing—a claim that Waymo vehemently denies.
