Manual Transmission Thwarts Thieves' Attempt To Steal A Woman's (Kia) Soul

Every year fewer new cars offer the option of a manual transmission, and thus more and more people don't know how to drive them. As Fox 17 reports, that worked in favor of a woman in Grand Rapids, Michigan, who credits her stick shift for thwarting an attempt to steal her soul. Her Kia Soul, that is.

On Monday morning, Lila Burns-Weerstra found her car's window broken and the steering column busted open, and posted pictures of them on the We Are Westsiders Facebook group. "Two teenage boys broke into my car at 2:58 am last night and tried to steal it, couldn't get it going I'm assuming because it's a manual," she wrote. "My two neighbors have front porch cameras and caught video, they were looking around into the other street parked cars." We won't be like Volkswagen and questionably advertise a manual transmission as a security feature, but she may have a point here.

I do have to wonder why the would-be thieves didn't notice that the car was a manual before breaking in. Maybe it's because they have been sold in less than 1% of new cars since 2021, according to the 2024 EPA Automotive Trends Report. If they assumed that whatever they broke into was some form of automatic, it was a statistically safe assumption, even if us enthusiasts hate to admit it.

We've seen manuals thwart thieves before, but what's unique about this case is that it's not the first time this has happened to her in this car. Burns-Weerstra told Fox 17 that she found it in the same condition three summers ago, broken into but with nothing stolen.

"I have briefly considered switching to an automatic after having to drive on the highway to work every single day," she said. "But now I probably am going to stick with manuals."

Unfortunately, she is still on the hook for repairs to her window, steering column, and ignition switch. Even if insurance covers it (and it doesn't always cover Kias), not having her car while it's being fixed is still inconvenient.

According to GM Authority, a Cadillac survey in 2020 revealed that 66% of American drivers know how to drive a manual transmission. That number seems a bit high to me, since only a few people I know besides my wife, friends who race, and auto journalists know how. If you've ever wanted to learn, you might want to pick one up while you still can. If you don't have a friend who can teach you, there is even a school for it. It might be a dying art form, but so is Morse code, and I know how to do that, too.