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A police van has crashed into an elderly couple’s car on a busy Cardiff road.

It is understood the van had driven through a red light on Western Avenue with its sirens on and blue lights flashing before colliding with a silver Renault Espace.

The Renault then crashed into a second car, closing one lane of the road in the eastbound direction.

Barney Sanders, 43, was travelling in the second car towards the University Hospital of Wales when he saw the police van coming out of the junction from Tesco Extra.

He described how it hit the elderly couple’s car, which then hit his car, at around 1.25pm.

He said: “I was a passenger in the car with two other people.

“We were driving up Western Avenue on the inside lane going through a green traffic light when we heard a police siren on our right.

“I think it was a Ford Transit. It went straight out into the traffic hitting an elderly couple driving a Renault Espace, which then hit our car.

“Their car ended up right up on the pavement and it’s pretty badly damaged, as is our’s.

“Luckily, none of us were seriously hurt but I think the elderly woman in the Renault did suffer a head injury. She’s now been taken away in an ambulance.”

He said that he and his fellow travellers have been asked to stay on the scene.

“We are all suffering from shock. The first police officer on the scene asked us if we were okay and we said yes, but that’s been it,” he said.

“The police supervisor has been interviewing the driver of our car and we’ve been told we can’t leave for now.

“There are an awful lot of police cars here.”

A spokesman for South Wales Police said: “Officers are currently in attendance at a road traffic collision involving a police vehicle which occurred at around 1.30pm on Western Avenue.”