Junkyard Find: 2009 Kia Rondo, Now With MORE BIOHAZARD!
It’s unusual, though not unheard-of, for sub-10-year-old cars to show up in the cheap self-service wrecking yards; most that do are from Detroit.
Or Korea.
I saw this ’07 Sedona covered with fingerpaint and hippie stickers in Wisconson a couple months ago, and now I’ve found this ’09 Kia Rondo in Colorado. The Rondo never made much of an impression in the United States and disappeared without a trace after the 2010 model year, so it’s of some interest as a forgotten car.
I’ve been seeing more of these BIOHAZARD stickers on junkyard cars lately, presumably due to some police department that discovers bodily fluids in a car after a crash and/or crime.
Nope. Not buying anything from the interior of this Rondo.
The Colorado State Parks pass on this crypto-minivan expired in August, so we can assume that it was driving very recently.
As rare as a Suzuki Equator? Maybe not, but close.
In much of the world, this car was (and is) known as the Kia Carens.
After the Rondo departed the United States market, its advertising featured The Croods.
Sales of the Rondo continued in Canada after Kia gave up on U.S. Rondo buyers. Is “Rondo” a household word up there? [Ehhh. —Mark]
Murilee Martin is the pen name of Phil Greden, a writer who has lived in Minnesota, California, Georgia and (now) Colorado. He has toiled at copywriting, technical writing, junkmail writing, fiction writing and now automotive writing. He has owned many terrible vehicles and some good ones. He spends a great deal of time in self-service junkyards. These days, he writes for publications including Autoweek, Autoblog, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars and Capital One.
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i repaired a "biohazard" a few years ago. a late model accord with a pretty decent front end hit, and the driver had emptied his bowels and bladder upon impact. cloth seats too.
Wisconsin