Carmakers Pick Engineering Firm, Manager for Takata Probe

A group of 10 carmakers has selected Virginia-based Orbital ATK Inc. to find the underlying reason why some Takata Corp. airbag inflators explode when triggered.

The consortium also confirmed the project will be managed by David Kelly, former acting administrator for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Orbital ATK is a global aerospace and defense engineering firm based in Dulles, Va. The carmakers say the company has more than 60 years of experience with "energetic" materials and their failure. Takata's inflators are unique among airbag makers in their use of ammonium nitrate as a propellant. The devices have been blamed with spewing metal fragments that have killed at least six people and injured at least 65 others.

Orbital ATK's effort will complement a probe already under way by Takata. Separately, NHTSA has ordered Takata to preserve and make available on demand some 10,000 inflators it has tested in search of a cause of the problem.

The agency also has upgraded its own investigation to an engineering analysis, often a precursor to ordering a recall. Carmakers so far have limited their Takata inflator recalls to high-temperature, high-humidity areas.