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Last year, two Waymo robotaxis in Phoenix "made contact" with the same pickup truck that was in the midst of being towed, which prompted the Alphabet subsidiary to issue a recall on its vehicles' software. A "recall" in this case meant rolling out a software update after investigating the issue and determining its root cause.

In a blog post, Waymo has revealed that on December 11, 2023, one of its robotaxis collided with a backwards-facing pickup truck being towed ahead of it. The company says the truck was being towed improperly and was angled across a center turn lane and a traffic lane. Apparently, the tow truck didn't pull over after the incident, and another Waymo vehicle came into contact with the pickup truck a few minutes later. Waymo didn't elaborate on what it meant by saying that its robotaxis "made contact" with the pickup truck, but it did say that the incidents resulted in no injuries and only minor vehicle damage. The self-driving vehicles involved in the collisions weren't carrying any passenger.

After an investigation, Waymo found that its software had incorrectly predicted the future movements of the pickup truck due to "persistent orientation mismatch" between the towed vehicle and the one towing it. The company developed and validated a fix for its software to prevent similar incidents in the future and started deploying the update to its fleet on December 20.

Since Broadcom's $61 billion acquisition of VMware closed in November 2023, Broadcom has been charging ahead with major changes to the company's personnel and products. In December, Broadcom began laying off thousands of employees and stopped selling perpetually licensed versions of VMware products, pushing its customers toward more stable and lucrative software subscriptions instead. In January, it ended its partner programs, potentially disrupting sales and service for many users of its products.

This week, Broadcom is making a change that is smaller in scale but possibly more relevant for home users of its products: The free version of VMware's vSphere Hypervisor, also known as ESXi, is being discontinued.

Thousands of U.S. ride-hailing workers plan to park their cars and picket at major U.S. airports Wednesday in what organizers say is their largest strike yet in a drive for better pay and benefits.

Uber and Lyft drivers plan daylong strikes in Chicago; Philadelphia; Pittsburgh; Miami; Orlando and Tampa, Florida; Hartford, Connecticut; Newark, New Jersey; Austin, Texas; and Providence, Rhode Island. Drivers also plan to hold midday demonstrations at airports in those cities, according to Justice for App Workers, the group organizing the effort.

North Kitsap's proposed school bond is failing in the initial returns from Tuesday's election, according to Kitsap County Auditor Paul Andrews, with just 36.88 percent of the votes counted in favor of the $242 million measure.

Two measures in Bremerton were passing in Tuesday's returns. Prop. 1, renewing a programs and operations levy, had 62.08 percent of votes in favor. Prop. 2, a bond that would replace two elementary schools and the district's alternative high school, among other projects, was narrowly passing, with 60.87 percent in favor.

A levy measure for Central Kitsap School District's levy renewal was trailing, with 48.74 percent of ballots counted in favor.

Two levy measures on Bainbridge Island were both passing, with 73.06 percent in favor of BISD's Prop. 1 and 74.02 percent in favor of Prop. 2.

Bonds require 60% voter approval, while levies require simple majority (50% plus one).

North Kitsap's proposed school bond is failing in the initial returns from Tuesday's election, according to Kitsap County Auditor Paul Andrews, with just 36.88 percent of the votes counted in favor of the $242 million measure.

Two measures in Bremerton were passing in Tuesday's returns. Prop. 1, renewing a programs and operations levy, had 62.08 percent of votes in favor. Prop. 2, a bond that would replace two elementary schools and the district's alternative high school, among other projects, was narrowly passing, with 60.87 percent in favor.

A levy measure for Central Kitsap School District's levy renewal was trailing, with 48.74 percent of ballots counted in favor.

Two levy measures on Bainbridge Island were both passing, with 73.06 percent in favor of BISD's Prop. 1 and 74.02 percent in favor of Prop. 2.

Bonds require 60% voter approval, while levies require simple majority (50% plus one).

BREMERTON — One Nimitz sailor was stabbed in the barracks in Bremerton and transported to a Seattle hospital Saturday morning, and two other Nimitz sailors are now in pre-trial confinement related to the incident, the Navy said.

Three sailors assigned to the Bremerton-based USS Nimitz aircraft carrier were involved in an altercation in the barracks at Naval Base Kitsap on Saturday, Nimitz spokesperson Tim Pietrack told Kitsap Sun.

One sailor was injured and transported to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle. The sailor is in stable condition, Pietrack said on Monday. Two other sailors are currently being held in pre-trial confinement at the Northwestern Joint Regional Correctional Facility at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, the spokesperson said.

The Poulsbo man suspected of murder and then driving his truck into multiple vehicles along Highway 3 early last Monday morning was arrested just minutes after leaving the scene where a 45-year-old victim, identified as Andrea Gaudette, was found the following day.

Gaudette was found after friends and co-workers asked Bremerton police to check her home in the 5000 block of Fifth Street, in Bremerton's Auto Center Way area, after not hearing from her all day Monday or Tuesday. The co-workers told police that Gaudette, who worked from home, had logged into her work computer but was unresponsive to repeated messages, according to the charging documents. The friends alerted police that Gaudette had expressed concern over issues related to a volatile relationship with a boyfriend she had lived with in the past but was not currently living in the Fifth Street home, who detectives identified as Harvey.

A Bremerton officer visited the home early that evening, initially knocking on doors and windows without any response, and then entering the home through a window in Gaudette's bedroom. Inside he found Gaudette, dead and with "severe bruising through her arms, chest, neck and face," a Bremerton officer wrote in his report.

Bremerton police detectives arrived after securing a search warrant for the home, and found Gaudette's computer was on and accessible. The computer, which Gaudette had signed into a day earlier, allowed them to access the video security system Gaudette had in the home, which included a camera pointed toward the living room and front door of the home.

The man was undergoing cancer treatment and had a suppressed immune system because of the drugs, which may have contributed to the severity of his illness, the bulletin said. It described him as elderly but didn’t provide his age.

Alaskapox, also known as AKPV, is related to smallpox, cowpox and mpox, health officials said. Symptoms can include a rash, swollen lymph nodes and joint or muscle pain.

Only six other cases of the virus have been reported to Alaska health officials since the first one in 2015. All involved people were living in the Fairbanks area, more than 300 miles (483 kilometers) from the Kenai Peninsula, health officials said.

Disney+ started getting strict about password sharing in Canada last year, and now it's expanding the restriction to the US. According to The Verge, the streaming service has been sending out emails to its subscribers in the country, notifying them about a change in its terms of service. Its service agreement now states that users may not share their passwords outside of their household "unless otherwise permitted by [their] service tier," suggesting the arrival of new subscription options in the future.

The Verge says Disney+ told subscribers that they can analyze the use of their account to "determine compliance," though it didn't elaborate on how its methods work exactly. "We're adding limitations on sharing your account outside of your household, and explaining how we may assess your compliance with these limitations," Disney+ reportedly wrote in its email. In its Service Agreement, the service describes "household" as "the collection of devices associated with [subscribers'] primary personal residence that are used by the individuals who reside therein." The rule already applies to new subscribers, but old ones have until March 14 to feel its effects.

In late December, Swift’s camp hit Jack Sweeney, a junior studying information technology at the University of Central Florida, with a cease-and-desist letter that blamed his automated tracking of her private jet for tipping off stalkers as to her location. In the letter, attorneys from the law firm Venable accused Sweeney of effectively providing “individuals intent on harming her, or with nefarious or violent intentions, a roadmap to carry out their plans.”

Sweeney provided the link to that letter in an email to the Associated Press. In that message, he emphasized that while he has never intended to cause harm, he also believes strongly in the importance of transparency and public information.

“One should reasonably expect that their jet will be tracked, whether or not I’m the one doing it, as it is public information after all,” he wrote.

A spokesperson for Swift echoed the legal complaint, saying that “the timing of stalkers” suggests a connection to Sweeney’s flight-tracking sites. The spokesperson did not respond to questions seeking elaboration of that charge, such as whether stalkers have been seen waiting for Swift at the airport when her plane arrived or, alternatively, if there is evidence that stalkers have somehow inferred Swift’s subsequent location from the arrival time of her flight.

The legal letter likewise accuses Sweeney of “disregarding the personal safety of others”; “willful and repeated harassment of our client”; and “intentional, offensive, and outrageous conduct and consistent violations of our client’s privacy.”

Such statements are difficult to square with the fact that Sweeney’s automated tracking accounts merely repackage public data provided by the Federal Aviation Administration, a government agency. That fact did not dissuade the Venable attorneys, who demanded that Sweeney “immediately stop providing information about our client’s location to the public.”

NASA's Perseverance Rover took a photo of its broken companion, the Ingenuity helicopter, as it sat alone on a dune.

Kitsap 911 board members accepted the immediate resignation of Richard Kirton, the agency's longtime executive director, on Tuesday after Kirton was arrested last week.

Kirton was arrested in King County as part of a sting operation in which he allegedly messaged an undercover police detective and agreed to pay a fake 16-year-old for sexual acts, KING 5 reported, citing court documents. When he arrived at a King County hotel room and messaged the detective’s profile that he was there, police arrested him at around 11 p.m., the TV station reported.

The elected officials who oversee Kitsap County's emergency dispatch agency held a brief special meeting Tuesday afternoon that included a private executive session "to review the performance of a public employee" and then afterwards voted to unanimously accept Kirton's resignation. They also appointed deputy director Maria Jameson-Owens to serve as the organization's acting executive director. By the end of Tuesday afternoon, Kirton's name and photo had been removed from the Kitsap 911 website.