An 18.4-tonne composite mini-bulk sample from the Freightrain pipe on Twin Mining‘s (TWG-T) Jackson Inlet property on Baffin Island, Nunavut, has yielded the largest stone recovered from the area so far.
The diamond measures 6.98 mm by 5.64 mm by 3.6 mm and was derived from a 16.54-tonne sample collected from bedrock kimberlite at sample site no. 2. It is classified as gem-quality and free of inclusions. It weighs in at 1 carat. Another stone measures 3.9 mm by 3.19 mm by 2.4 mm and weighs about 0.22 carat.
The 16.5-tonne sample also contained a large number of diamond fragments, which the company says may indicate the breakage of other large diamonds during either the mining phase or processing.
In all, the sample returned 74 diamonds measuring more than 1 mm in one dimension and totalling nearly 3.1 carats in weight. Most of the stones are classified as white and transparent.
The same site previously surrendered a 0.768-carat, gem-quality, white and transparent stone measuring 5.4 mm along its longest dimension.
A 1.9-tonne sample from site no. 1 returned 12 stones (larger than 1 mm) for a total of 0.56 carat. This sample also yielded two stones exceeding 3.1 mm in their longest dimension; together they weighed in at 0.31 carat.
Twin Mining is encouraged by the fact that this year’s samples returned a larger percentage (38%) of plus-1-mm stones than last year’s smaller sample from the same sites (25%).
“I am very optimistic about the Jackson Inlet property because of the high proportion of large, gem-quality diamonds, the 11 magnetic anomalies and the potential for the Freightrain pipe, based on aeromagnetic interpretation, to rank in dimensions among the world’s top 10 productive pipes,” says Dallas Davis, Twin Mining’s director of diamond mining.
The company has a drill on-site to delineate the Freightrain pipe and to investigate other magnetic anomalies. Equipment for bulk-sampling is slated to arrive in late July.
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