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Vancouver, BC—Lucara Diamond Corp. has recovered a 1,174.76-carat rough diamond (image) from its Karowe Diamond Mine in Botswana, just weeks after a 1,098-carat stone was unearthed by Debswana, the mining company jointly owned by De Beers and the Government of Botswana. Lucara’s diamond (image), while 76 carats larger than Debswana’s, is not entirely gem quality, whereas Debswana’s is. Lucara’s stone, measuring 77 x 55 x 33mm, is described in a company statement as a clivage gem of variable quality with significant domains of high-quality white gem material. It was recovered from direct milling of ore sourced from the EM/PK(S) unit of the South Lobe and represents the third 1,000+ carat diamond recovered from the South Lobe of the AK6 kimberlite since 2015. The other two were the 1,758 carat Sewelô and 1,109 carat Lesedi La Rona. 

The new diamond was recovered in the MDR (Mega Diamond Recovery) XRT circuit. 

Lucara CEO Eira Thomas said in a statement, “Lucara is delighted to be reporting another historic diamond recovery and its 3rd diamond over 1,000 carats, a world record for Karowe. Although complex, these diamond recoveries do contain large domains of top colour white gem that will be transformed through our partnership with HB Antwerp into valuable collections of top colour polished diamonds, very much in high demand in the market today. Besides the 1,174 carat stone, several other high quality white gems were recovered up to 148 carats in size, and year to date Karowe has produced 17 diamonds greater than 100 carats, including 5 diamonds greater than 300 carats.” 

Lucara has produced a significant number of large stones since adopting a special technology to keep them from getting crushed during excavation. During an 11-day production run in June that sourced the 1,174-carat stone, several other high quality white gems were also recovered (148 carat, 90 carat, 88 carat, 86 carat, and 67 carat). Diamonds recovered greater than 10.8 carat in weight accounted for 17.5% weight percent of total production during this period. Excluding the 1,174-carat diamond, the weight percent of 10.8+ carat diamonds was in line with resource expectations. Continued strong resource performance and recovery of large diamonds reinforces the significance of the EM/PK(S) as an important economic driver for a proposed underground mine at Karowe, says the company.