AirAsia Search: Pings Detected In Hunt For Black Box, Investigator Says

JAKARTA, Jan 9 (Reuters) - Indonesia search and rescue teams hunting for the wreck of an AirAsia passenger jet have detected pings in their efforts to find the black box recorders, Santoso Sayogo, an investigator at the National Transportation Safety Committee, told Reuters on Friday.

Indonesia AirAsia Flight QZ8501 vanished from radar screens on Dec. 28 less than half way into a two-hour flight from Indonesia's second-biggest city of Surabaya to Singapore. There were no survivors among the 162 people on board.

Indonesian search teams loaded lifting balloons on to helicopters on Friday ahead of an operation to raise the tail section of the jet, although Sayogo said it appeared that the black box was no longer in the tail and divers were confirming its position. (Reporting by Charlotte Greenfield; writing by Michael Taylor; Editing by Nick Macfie)