Argyle Smoke Creek Alluvial Diamond Project
JORC Compliant Inferred Resource has been estimated at 21.5 Mt at an average grade of 28 CPHT for 6,000,000 carats, using a cut-off of 10 CPHT.
The 1979 discovery of alluvial diamonds in Smoke Creek led to the discovery of the world-class Argyle diamond deposit (East Kimberley). Prior to mining operations commencing at Argyle in 1985, Argyle Diamond Mines (ADM) mined parts of Smoke Creek. The alluvial diamonds in the Argyle area appear to have all been derived from the erosion of the Argyle pipe, as no other significant source of diamonds has been found to date. Diamonds have been deposited in alluvial deposits during a number of episodes from the Miocene (25 Ma) to present, with the younger deposits representing deposition from the eroding Argyle pipe and reworking of areas of pre-existing alluvial gravels. The Venus Alluvial Diamond project area comprises 9 granted Prospecting Licences (PLs) and 13 pending PLs, which lies adjacent to the primary deposit which hosts Argyle’s current mine. These PL areas cover previous ADM Mining Leases. ADM carried out reconnaissance bulk sampling programmes for diamonds in the 1980s and 1990s.
Venus commissioned geological consultants Widenbar and Associates to produce a preliminary resource estimate for the Smoke Creek alluvial diamond project. The resource estimate of the project area (9 granted Prospecting Licences) is based on the ADM-mapped extent of “C Terrace Gravels”, and the published results of ADM’s reconnaissance bulk sampling. The document produced by ADM at surrender of the Mining Leases is very comprehensive in describing sampling methodologies and it is considered that the data is valid and usable for resource estimation.
Widenbar Associates has reviewed the drilling, sampling and assaying data used in the estimate and considers it to be of sufficient quality to support the resource classification applied. The JORC compliant Inferred Resource has been estimated at 21.5 Mt at an average grade of 28 CPHT for 6,000,000 carats, using a cut-off of 10 CPHT.
Potential sites for bulk sampling within 9 Prospecting Licences have been defined and approvals are being sought for bulk sampling in May 2011 to extract diamonds to establish quality and value distributions.