An Arbutus Volunteer Fire Department collided with another car on Washington Boulevard while on a non-emergency errand Sunday evening, causing one driver to be sent to the R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center.

The incident happened at around 6:15 p.m. on the 3600-block of Washington Boulevard, just inside the Beltway at one of two entrances of the busy Lansdowne Shopping Center -- a tragic punctuation mark to the holiday weekend.

The AVFD utility vehicle, a Chevrolet Suburban, was traveling northbound on Washington Boulevard when it struck a Chrysler New Yorker driven by an unidentified driver.

A dispatcher for the Baltimore County Fire Department described the collision as head-on.

After striking the other car, the Suburban knocked a fire hydrant dozens of feet down the Washington Boulevard, jumped the curb on the east side of the street near a bus stop, went through a fence, and struck three cars in the parking lot in front of Three Brothers Italian Restaurant.

"I was in there and eating when I felt the building shake and a loud thump," says Tamberly Mentzer of Arbutus, owner of one of the cars damaged by the utility vehicle.

The driver of the Chrysler was transported to Shock Trauma, according to several sources. Attempts to learn the driver's condition have been unsuccessful.

AVDF president John McDowell confirmed that the utility vehicle was being driven by a department member, and that he was not on an emergency call. "He was on a detail to pick up supplies," McDowell says.

McDowell declined to identify the firefighter involved in the incident while it is being investigated. He also declined to identify the destination of the vehicle or further describe the nature of the detail.

The firefighter was transported to St Agnes Hospital without serious injuries.