The co-CEO of Waymo, Tekedra Mawakana, raised eyebrows this week when she suggested that society was ready for one of the company’s self-driving taxis to kill someone.
“You know, we don’t say ‘whether,” she said Monday at TechCrunch’s Disrupt summit. “We say ‘when.’ And we plan for them.”
But maybe the real question is whether Waymo was prepared for when one of its vehicles would take the life of a beloved bodega cat. Just hours after her remarks on Monday, a resident cat at San Francisco liquor store Randa’s Market named KitKat was found in the street fighting for his life.
A motorist named Jeff Klein recounted the horrific scene to Mission Local. He was driving behind the Waymo at 11:40PM on 16th Street, he says, when the robotaxi suddenly jerked off course.
“Some folks on the sidewalk started yelling and grabbed the cat right out from under where the Waymo swerved from,” Klein shared. He was able to capture a photo of the car allegedly responsible for the catslaughter as it drove off.
At 12:51 a.m. on Tuesday morning, the outlet reports, a 311 complaint stated that a Waymo “hit the liquor store’s cat that was sitting on the sidewalk next to the transit lane.” It claimed that the driverless car “did not even try to stop.”
The nine-year old feline was beloved on the block and has left a community of heavy hearts with his passing. On Tuesday evening, mourners gathered outside of Randa’s Market to pay their respects to KitKat’s owner, leaving mementos like KitKat bars and tequila on a milk crate altar to commemorate his life.
A sign reportedly read: “Kill a Waymo! Save a Cat!”
Waymo has yet to comment on the tragedy.
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