Australian investigators will review engine maintenance records as they look for the cause of the uncontained failure on Aug. 30 of a Rolls-Royce RB211-524G engine on a Qantas Boeing 747-400. The investigation also will include “further examination and testing of engine components with a view to identifying the factors that contributed to the engine failure,” says the Australian Transport Safety Bureau in a preliminary report setting out its initial finding into the facts of the incident.

Chinese missile and space group Casic is pushing into civil aircraft manufacturing, announcing that it plans to set up a factory to make composite parts, including some for the Comac C919 airliner. The move presents the world’s composites suppliers with an important new competitor, and it is part of the group’s wider strategy to move into civil markets. That strategy is itself part of a national policy requiring defense manufacturers to diversify.

BEIJING — Japan plans to increase its submarine fleet to 24 boats from the current 18, Kyodo News reports. The larger submarine force will increase the country’s capacity to maintain patrols in nearby water, especially the East China Sea, the news agency reports amid a period of unusually tense relations with China. The country will do this by extending the operational lives of its submarines, which have traditionally been kept short to hold down the size of the fleet while maintaining a building rate of one a year.