The robotaxi service Waymo called the police on two California teens who were allegedly drinking while underage and shooting a toy gun, the San Mateo Police Department said on July 6.

“Parents do you know where your teens are? [Waymo] does!” the department stated in an Instagram post. “The Waymo might have been the smartest idea yet, because driving impaired would’ve made this so much worse.”

The police department alleged that the two 15-year-olds drank alcohol while shooting Orbeez—small gel beads used as toys—from the vehicle that chauffeured them around San Mateo, a city in the San Francisco Bay Area. The autonomous vehicle stopped and called the police.

The authorities arrived and safely removed both individuals from the car. Police determined that what the teenagers had been allegedly shooting was a toy gun.

The department said the teens were detained but did not disclose further details, including whether the pair had been arrested or whether they will face any consequences.

“While there was some ingenuity to this scheme, toy guns, water guns, and BB guns all pose real dangers, especially to an untrained eye. The simple handling of them can cause fear in [passersby] or to those who don’t get a good look,” the police department said. “Shooting projectiles at speed can cause real damage. And [let’s] not forget the underage drinking. All bad ideas today for these two.”

Waymo allows children 14 to 17 years old to ride alone using teen accounts but says these accounts must be connected to parental accounts that have oversight over them, and that the company may contact parents in the event of issues or incidents.

According to the online Waymo help center, the company’s vehicles are programmed to pull over or stop in the road if they experience any safety risks.

Waymo was originally a project started by Google in 2009 using Toyota Prius vehicles. In 2015, Google took the project to public roads for the first time, having a legally blind man ride in one of its own autonomous cars, the Firefly, in Austin, Texas.

According to the company’s website, Waymo became an independent company in 2016 and in 2022 began offering fully autonomous rides—with no human driver—for select riders in San Francisco through a waitlist and its Trusted Tester program.

In 2024, the company opened its autonomous rides in San Francisco for anyone to use through the Waymo app. The company has since expanded to other major cities nationwide.