diff --git a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/BUILD b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/BUILD
index cba56f896e4..9b73ad4b990 100644
--- a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/BUILD
+++ b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/BUILD
@@ -84,5 +84,6 @@ go_test(
         "//vendor:github.com/docker/engine-api/types/container",
         "//vendor:github.com/golang/mock/gomock",
         "//vendor:github.com/stretchr/testify/assert",
+        "//vendor:github.com/stretchr/testify/require",
     ],
 )
diff --git a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/docker_container.go b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/docker_container.go
index 257807d9285..dc04ace491b 100644
--- a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/docker_container.go
+++ b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/docker_container.go
@@ -174,6 +174,8 @@ func (ds *dockerService) CreateContainer(podSandboxID string, config *runtimeApi
 
 	createConfig.HostConfig = hc
 	createResp, err := ds.client.CreateContainer(createConfig)
+	recoverFromConflictIfNeeded(ds.client, err)
+
 	if createResp != nil {
 		return createResp.ID, err
 	}
diff --git a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/docker_sandbox.go b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/docker_sandbox.go
index 689d937d283..88fcb4716cd 100644
--- a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/docker_sandbox.go
+++ b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/docker_sandbox.go
@@ -68,6 +68,8 @@ func (ds *dockerService) RunPodSandbox(config *runtimeApi.PodSandboxConfig) (str
 		return "", fmt.Errorf("failed to make sandbox docker config for pod %q: %v", config.Metadata.GetName(), err)
 	}
 	createResp, err := ds.client.CreateContainer(*createConfig)
+	recoverFromConflictIfNeeded(ds.client, err)
+
 	if err != nil || createResp == nil {
 		return "", fmt.Errorf("failed to create a sandbox for pod %q: %v", config.Metadata.GetName(), err)
 	}
diff --git a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/helpers.go b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/helpers.go
index 936a590363f..ee2440dbfa5 100644
--- a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/helpers.go
+++ b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/helpers.go
@@ -18,6 +18,7 @@ package dockershim
 
 import (
 	"fmt"
+	"regexp"
 	"strconv"
 	"strings"
 
@@ -37,6 +38,10 @@ const (
 	annotationPrefix = "annotation."
 )
 
+var (
+	conflictRE = regexp.MustCompile(`Conflict. (?:.)+ is already in use by container ([0-9a-z]+)`)
+)
+
 // apiVersion implements kubecontainer.Version interface by implementing
 // Compare() and String(). It uses the compare function of engine-api to
 // compare docker apiversions.
@@ -282,3 +287,30 @@ func getUserFromImageUser(imageUser string) (*int64, *string) {
 	// If user is a numeric uid.
 	return &uid, nil
 }
+
+// See #33189. If the previous attempt to create a sandbox container name FOO
+// failed due to "device or resource busy", it is possbile that docker did
+// not clean up properly and has inconsistent internal state. Docker would
+// not report the existence of FOO, but would complain if user wants to
+// create a new container named FOO. To work around this, we parse the error
+// message to identify failure caused by naming conflict, and try to remove
+// the old container FOO.
+// TODO(#33189): Monitor the tests to see if the fix is sufficent.
+func recoverFromConflictIfNeeded(client dockertools.DockerInterface, err error) {
+	if err == nil {
+		return
+	}
+
+	matches := conflictRE.FindStringSubmatch(err.Error())
+	if len(matches) != 2 {
+		return
+	}
+
+	id := matches[1]
+	glog.Warningf("Unable to create pod sandbox due to conflict. Attempting to remove sandbox %q", id)
+	if err := client.RemoveContainer(id, dockertypes.ContainerRemoveOptions{RemoveVolumes: true}); err != nil {
+		glog.Errorf("Failed to remove the conflicting sandbox container: %v", err)
+	} else {
+		glog.V(2).Infof("Successfully removed conflicting sandbox %q", id)
+	}
+}
diff --git a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/helpers_test.go b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/helpers_test.go
index 0fa927f1a68..9fb0daebc37 100644
--- a/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/helpers_test.go
+++ b/pkg/kubelet/dockershim/helpers_test.go
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@ import (
 	"testing"
 
 	"github.com/stretchr/testify/assert"
+	"github.com/stretchr/testify/require"
 
 	"k8s.io/kubernetes/pkg/api"
 	runtimeApi "k8s.io/kubernetes/pkg/kubelet/api/v1alpha1/runtime"
@@ -227,3 +228,12 @@ func TestGetUserFromImageUser(t *testing.T) {
 		assert.Equal(t, test.name, actualName)
 	}
 }
+
+func TestParsingCreationConflictError(t *testing.T) {
+	// Expected error message from docker.
+	msg := "Conflict. The name \"/k8s_POD_pfpod_e2e-tests-port-forwarding-dlxt2_81a3469e-99e1-11e6-89f2-42010af00002_0\" is already in use by container 24666ab8c814d16f986449e504ea0159468ddf8da01897144a770f66dce0e14e. You have to remove (or rename) that container to be able to reuse that name."
+
+	matches := conflictRE.FindStringSubmatch(msg)
+	require.Len(t, matches, 2)
+	require.Equal(t, matches[1], "24666ab8c814d16f986449e504ea0159468ddf8da01897144a770f66dce0e14e")
+}