Where's Charlie? Bad news from Detroit & a different reporter is trying to track down the commissioner.

Read FireTruckBlog.com's story on Detroit's apparatus problems at house fire

Glenn Usdin's FireTruckBlog.com posted this story last night about a delay in rescuing a three-year-old girl at a house fire in Detroit Tuesday morning. FireTruckBlog.com has the WJBK-TV interview with union president Dan McNamara saying that the first unit on the scene was a TAC unit, a small pumper with a disabled pump. McNamara says TAC units and pickup trucks are being used to replace broken front line equipment because of the lack of reserve units.

WJBK-TV went to Detroit Fire Department Headquarters in search of Commissioner Donald Austin. The word came back that Austin was in a meeting and no one responded to the serious allegations made by the union president. This time it wasn't reporter Charlie LeDuff on the search of the commissioner. No word on where Charlie is either.

Until now, Commissioner Austin has seemed ready, willing and able to handle the tough questions and, from the stories we have seen, he has not been hiding from LeDuff or other reporters. But, with a little girl who is critically injured and some serious charges about the fire department's response to the house fire, you would think Commissioner Austin would want to make sure someone was available to answer questions, even if he couldn't be.