The Sunnyvale man said the trunk would not open before the driverless car pulled away from San Jose Mineta International Airport.
SAN JOSE, CA — A Sunnyvale man says a Waymo robotaxi drove away from San Jose Mineta International Airport with his suitcase still in the trunk after a Monday ride to catch a business flight.
Di Jin said the trip was his first ride in a driverless taxi and that the ride from his Sunnyvale home to the airport went smoothly until he tried to collect his luggage. The case has drawn attention because San Jose’s airport recently became a key testing ground for commercial robotaxi service in California, where airport trips put autonomous ride-hailing into a high-pressure setting for travelers carrying bags, work materials and personal items.
Jin said he arrived at the airport Monday and got out of the Waymo vehicle, then went to the back to open the trunk. He said the trunk did not respond when he tried to open it. “I pressed the trunk open button, try to get my luggage, but it doesn’t do anything, and it drives away immediately,” Jin said. He said he called Waymo customer service right away, but was told the vehicle was already headed back to a depot and could not be turned around. Jin then boarded his flight to San Diego without his suitcase, a change of clothes or work notes he said he needed for the trip.
Waymo later emailed Jin and told him the luggage had been secured at a local depot, according to the account he shared with NBC Bay Area. The company offered two options, Jin said: he could pay shipping or courier costs, or he could use two complimentary Waymo rides to travel to and from the depot to pick up the bag. Jin said the depot trip would mean more than two hours of travel from Sunnyvale, and he objected to paying to recover items he said were never abandoned. “It doesn’t make any sense at all, because it’s not my mistake,” Jin said. Waymo had not provided a statement to NBC Bay Area when the station published its report.
The dispute centers on whether the bag should be treated as a lost item or as property that remained in a vehicle because the trunk failed to open. Waymo’s public help page says riders can open the trunk by pressing a trunk release button above the license plate or by tapping “open trunk” in the app. The same page says the trunk should automatically open when a rider exits at the destination. Jin said that did not happen. He said he made clear to Waymo that he had tried to retrieve the suitcase before the car left. The company’s lost-and-found policy says Waymo is not responsible for items left behind after a trip ends and does not provide refunds or reimbursement for the value of lost items.
San Jose Mineta International Airport became California’s first commercial airport to allow paid Waymo rides, adding a major travel hub to the company’s Bay Area service. The airport rollout made San Jose a prominent site for driverless airport trips as the company expands beyond city rides and neighborhood pickups. Airport service adds new demands for robotaxis because passengers often use trunks for luggage and may be moving under time pressure. The episode also echoes a previous Bay Area complaint from a San Francisco tennis coach who said a Waymo drove off with tennis equipment in the trunk after he was unable to retrieve it. In that earlier case, Waymo said its support team works to reunite riders with forgotten items.
No lawsuit or government enforcement action had been reported in Jin’s case as of Saturday. The next steps appear to depend on Waymo’s customer-service response and whether the company changes the recovery options offered to Jin. The key unresolved issue is whether Waymo will treat the suitcase as an ordinary lost-and-found matter or as a service failure tied to the trunk. It also remains unclear whether Waymo reviewed trip data, vehicle logs, app commands or camera records from the airport drop-off. Those records could help show whether the trunk received an open command, whether it tried to open and whether the car departed before Jin had a reasonable chance to remove the bag.
Jin said the incident changed how he viewed the ride, even though he still supports driverless technology. He described the drive itself as uneventful, then said the customer-service process left him frustrated because the offered solutions placed the burden on him. “I already told them very clearly it’s not lost and found,” Jin said. For travelers watching the case, the scene was simple: a passenger at an airport curb, a suitcase in a closed trunk and a driverless car leaving before the bag was back in its owner’s hands. For Waymo, the account adds a public test of how the company handles problems when no human driver is present to stop, open the trunk or resolve a dispute at the curb.
As of Saturday, Jin’s luggage had been reported secured at a Waymo depot, but the disagreement over who should pay or travel to recover it remained unresolved. Waymo’s next public response, if any, will determine whether the case ends as a customer-service complaint or becomes part of a broader debate over driverless airport rides.
Author note: Last updated May 2, 2026.