Nissan builds one millionth example of vehicle with name nobody can pronounce

Even after setting aside actual SUVs like the Xterra, Pathfinder and Armada, Infiniti's offerings QX, EX and FX, and the crossovers its developed for its sister company Renault like the new Koleos, the Japanese automaker produces its own crossovers by, well... the truckload. Here we've got the Rogue, the Juke, and the Murano, joined overseas by such models as the Patrol, the X-Trail, and this, the Qashqai.

Available in standard five-seat and long-wheelbase seven-seat configurations, the Qashqai was launched in 2007 and facelifted in 2010. It's offered with a range of four-cylinder engines, driving either the front wheels or all four through CVT or manual transmissions, and takes on the likes of the Kia Sportage and Mitsubishi Outlander. It's also popular in the Japanese and Australian markets, where it's known as the Dualis.

In addition to production in Japan and Iran (whose nomadic tribe Turkic Qashqai gives it its name), the crossover is built primarily in the UK at Sunderland, where the vehicle's production has just passed the million-made mark, standing as one of the most prolific automobiles ever made there. In fact, no other vehicle has reached that number in such a short time in Britain's considerable automaking history.

According to Nissan, over the course of the four-and-a-half years of production, Qashqai production at Synderland has accounted for as much steel as is being used to build all the facilities that will support London's Olympic games next year. And if you line up every Qashqai produced at the Sunderland plant, they'd measure 2,700 miles end-to-end – that's enough to line Britain's entire coastline.

Not about to stop there, Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn recently announced during a meeting with British Prime Minister David Cameron that an all-new Qashqai will be entirely designed, engineered and built in the UK.