The Waymo driver tech is impressive. That said an experienced driver might have recognized the pattern where a stopped big vehicle occludes a part of the road leading to such situation, and might have stopped or slowed down almost to a halt before passing. The Waymo driver reacts faster but is not able to predict such scenarios by filling the gaps, simulating the world to inform decisions. Chapeau to Waymo anyways

There have been many instances of Waymo preventing a collision by predicting pedestrians emerging from occlusion. This isn’t new information at all for them. Some accidents are simply physically impossible to prevent. I don’t know for sure if this one was one of those, but I’m fairly confident it couldn’t have been from prediction failure.

See past examples:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=hubWIuuz-e4 — first save is a child emerging from a parked car. Notice how Waymo slows down preemptively before the child starts moving.

https://www.reddit.com/r/waymo/s/ivQPuExwNW — detects foot movement from under the bus.

https://www.reddit.com/r/waymo/s/LURJ8isQJ6 — stops for dogs and children running onto the street at night.

I think this definitely an improvement to consider, but when comparing I think that big number, i.e. statistics are the only thing that matters. Some human could detect the pattern and come to full halt another human driver could be speeding while texting