Low-cost sector not expected to be hit

China's rapidly developing low-cost airline sector is unlikely to be affected by the disappearance of an AirAsia Berhad plane on Sunday, as such carriers have a good safety record, experts said.

An AirAsia aircraft with 162 people on board vanished on Sunday morning, 50 minutes after taking off from Surabaya, Indonesia's second-largest city, en route to Singapore.

The carrier has not seen a rush of requests for ticket refunds or a decline in sales in China since the plane vanished, airline official Lin Liyun said on Monday.