[bryanlarsen]

> If a human was in that Waymo, they would have moved quickly.

Some humans would have exactly the same response as the Waymo. When a human brain gets completely overwhelmed and doesn't know what to do, it drops down into animal behavior -- freeze or flee.

Given that it's a dangerous multi-ton machine, a Waymo likely has a programmed default behavior of "do nothing & phone home for instructions".

Which isn't an excuse -- an emergency vehicle is not an uncommon situation and Waymo should know what to do before being allowed on public roads.

A failure to get remedy instructions in a timely fashion from a human is even more alarming. Google is famous for automating tasks that should be performed by a human.