Diamond hunters make new kimberlite finds

Exploration firms working in the Kitikmeot and Kivalliq regions reported this week that their summer exploration programs have turned up new discoveries of kimberlite.

Kimberlite is a mineral, usually found in long, narrow pipes under the ground, that often contains diamonds.

In the Kivalliq region, just south of Rankin Inlet, a consortium of three companies exploring an area called the “Churchill Diamond Project” reported this past Tuesday that they’ve found four more kimberlite pipes, bringing the total number they’ve found this year to 15. Samples from those finds are now being tested for their microdiamond content.

Although the finds are highly promising, they do not necessarily show that there are commercial quantities of diamonds in the area. But the companies — Shear Minerals, Stornoway Diamond Corp., and BHP Billiton — say they are becoming more confident in their belief that they have discovered a large kimberlite field in the Kivalliq.

In the Kitikmeot region, Tahera Corp., a proponent of the small, $50-million Jericho diamond mine proposal, says it has found a kimberlite dyke about nine kilometres south of the diamond-rich Jericho kimberlite pipe.

Samples from the dyke will analyzed for microdiamond