West Midlands Police officers were attacked and had seemingly volatile chemicals thrown on them less than 24 hours after a colleague was mown down in a hijacked police vehicle.

The precise location of the incident has not been disclosed, but involved officers from the Operational Support Unit (OSU) for West Midlands Police, which covers a wide area including the multicultural cities of Birmingham, Coventry, and Wolverhampton.

The OSU, which provides its police force with “Specialist Search Teams (including water, heights and confined spaces), Advanced Public Order & Method of Entry [capabilities]”, tweeted: “This is what our officers have had to deal with this afternoon” along with two pictures of a riot shield smeared with a substance which had seemingly caused it to break out in a web of cracks and fissures.

“U4B involved in detaining a violent male who had barricaded himself in a premises. After officers forced entry he attacked them with physical violence and threw unknown chemicals at them,” the OSU explained, appending their message with the hashtag #ProtectTheProtectors.

This is what our officers have had to deal with this afternoon. U4B involved in detaining a violent male who had barricaded himself in a premises. After officers forced entry he attacked them with physical violence and threw unknown chemicals at them #ProtectTheProtectors pic.twitter.com/cJpiowLVn4 — Ops Support Unit WMP (@OSU_WMP) August 11, 2019

The attack took place less than 24 hours after another West Midlands Police officer, aged 42, was allegedly “violently assaulted and punched to the ground” by suspected carjacker Mubashar Hussain, who went on to hijack a police vehicle and knock down the officer a second time by reversing into him “before driving over his body as he lay pinned under the vehicle,” according to an official statement.

Hussain was later arrested in Sparkbrook, an area of Birmingham which has been described as Britain’s “jihadi capital”, and charged with a “catalogue of offences” including “causing serious injury by dangerous driving, a separate count of dangerous driving, wounding another officer who suffered a cut arm, four counts of assaulting other PCs, driving while disqualified, motoring offences, and two car thefts” as well as attempted murder.

Another man, Ahsan Ghafoor, was also “charged with the same two car thefts, plus dangerous driving and other motoring offences”, but the extent of his involvement with the incident as a whole is unclear.

Superintendent Tom Joyce said it was “difficult to give a prognosis” for his injured colleague condition, saying he was “relieved to say that [his injuries] are not believed to be life-threatening” but warning that they are “certainly potentially life-changing” and included a broken pelvis and internal injuries.

He has already undergone surgery and it is reported that he will need multiple operations.

Officer Run over with Own Patrol Car in ‘Sickening Attack’ in Birmingham https://t.co/nhDxn1lsXv — Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) August 11, 2019

Follow Jack Montgomery on Twitter: @JackBMontgomery