Los Angeles fire engines crash, and one rams Chinese restaurant

Fifteen people were injured, including at least five firefighters, when two fire engines collided in a Los Angeles suburb, sending one careering across a footpath and into a Chinese restaurant.

One of the victims was in critical condition, officials said.

The crash on a busy commercial strip in Monterey Park on Wednesday left one engine embedded in the Lu Dumpling House, with shattered glass and rubble heaped on the footpath. Chairs and tables were scattered inside.

"There was a loud boom and a lot of shaking. I thought it was an earthquake," said Wendy Wu, a waitress who was in a walk-in freezer when the fire engine ploughed through the front of the restaurant.

When she walked out from the freezer, uninjured, she saw a refrigerator pushed across the room and furniture in disarray. Speaking through an interpreter, she said she saw several injured people bleeding and attempting to stand.

Waitress Vivian Lu arrived for her shift moments after the fire engine rammed the building.