[img id=”78885″ align=”alignleft”]

Two University of Chicago Police Department (UCPD) vehicles collided Tuesday night at the intersection of East 57th Street and South Ellis Avenue while rushing to the scene of a reported shooting.

According to UCPD Public Information Officer Robert Mason, the crash occurred at 9:30 p.m. One of the cars was travelling west down 57th Street, while the other was going south on Ellis Avenue from 56th street. Both cars had their sirens and strobe lights on at the time of collision.

One of the UCPD cars spun out of control and hit five parked cars. According to Mason, none of the parked cars were occupied and the University will pay for the damages that the neighboring cars sustained in the crash.

One policeman was injured and taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where he was treated for minor injuries and released. According to Mason, he was not taken to the University of Chicago Medical Center two blocks away because it does not have a trauma center.

“For any sort of trauma, if the fire department responds, the ambulance goes to a trauma center,” Mason said. “The Chicago fire department responded [and] they take people to the nearest trauma center.”

Several other UCPD units arrived at the crash site after finding no signs of the reported shooting at 61st Street and Cottage Grove Avenue, according to Mason.

One of the UCPD cars was towed from the scene of the collision, while the other was driven off the site.

In spite of the damage to the police cars, Mason said that this will not affect UCPD’s response capabilities. “We have other cars, it doesn’t mean that we can’t put people on the street,” he said.