The van careened backwards and rammed into a shuttle bus, striking a minibus and a taxi on the way

Police chase their van: a source says the handbrake was improperly applied by an inexperienced driver

Three people were injured today when a runaway police van with improperly set handbrake plunged down Cotton Tree Drive and rammed into a shuttle bus, striking a minibus and a taxi on the way.

A minibus driver with bleeding face and a van passenger with an injured hand were among the three injured and taken to Queen Mary Hospital after the incident, which happened at 14.15 outside Hong Kong Squash Centre, say police.

A minibus driver was taken to hospital with a bleeding face

A spokesman says the vehicle was attending an earlier traffic accident. “The police left the vehicle to attend to the accident,” says the spokesman.

But a police source, who asked not to be named, says “the handbrake was not applied properly by an inexperienced new police driver.”

The source says the vehicle had a manual handbrake, and that the vehicle was on Mobile Video duty when it stopped to assist a road accident. The mobile video units patrol roads to catch drivers using mobile phones, skipping red lights and other driving offences.