Freetown, 26th August 2024. The Ministry of Mines and Mineral Resources and the National Minerals Agency are delighted to announce the recovery of a 391.45-carat diamond from the Meya Mine in Kono District, Eastern Sierra Leone. The diamond, which was recovered on Tuesday, 20 August 2024, is the second exceptional diamond mined and recovered from the Meya River kimberlite domain, the first of 16 kimberlite domains within the mining licence area to be targeted by the Company.
It could be recalled that in November 2017, Meya Mining recovered a 476 carats Type IIa diamond (the Meya Prosperity) during its initial bulk sampling Programme. As with the Meya Prosperity, which came from a 523.44 carat diamond that was broken into three pieces (476.98 carat, 27.89 carat and 18.58 carat), this stone was a 514.99 carat also broken into 3 pieces (391.53 carat, 105.43 carat and 18.11 carat).
The recovery of yet another large, superdeep Type IIa diamond is significant from a geological perspective, as these diamonds are known to originate from much deeper in the lower mantle of the earth, at depths of ~750 km below surface, versus ~150-250 km where most natural diamonds are formed. According to Casey Hetman, P.Geo. from SRK Consulting, large Type IIa diamonds that were sampled from the lower mantle and transported to the surface at Meya have a better chance of remaining intact during emplacement close to the surface because they are not subjected to explosive fragmentation processes related to pipe development, because they have been emplaced within dykes at Meya.
Both exceptional stones were detected and recovered by the Company’s bespoke processing plant, designed and constructed by Consulmet (South Africa). The specific technology deployed to enable the recovery of these large diamonds is from Tomra Sorting Solutions in Germany.
Jan Joubert, CEO of Meya Mining, had this to say about the Company’s latest recovery: “Only four mines in the world infrequently recover these exceptional >500 carat diamonds. The fact that Meya has recovered two >500 carat Type IIa diamonds after treating only 84,195 tonnes of competent kimberlite from the Meya River domain, suggests that there is a high probability of recovering more and possibly bigger diamonds once the mine reaches steady state production of 500,000 tonnes kimberlite throughput per annum. Our priority now is to ensure that going forward we can recover these high value stones intact. We will work closely with our engineering and processing partners to upgrade the plant, eliminate breakages and increase its capacity to recover exceptionally large diamonds”.
This recovery also marks the 6th time an exceptional diamond has been recovered from the area. It once again highlights Sierra Leone’s geo economic potential, especially as an exceptional diamond producer. Since 1945, no less than 6 of the largest diamonds recovered globally, came from Sierra Leone. These include the; 770 carat Woyie Diamond (1945), 620 carat Sefadu Diamond (1970), 969 carat Star of Sierra Leone (1973), 709 carat Peace Diamond (2017), 476 Meya Prosperity (2017) and now the 391 carat.
Responding to news of the recovery, Julius Daniel Mattai, Sierra Leone’s Minister of Mines and Mineral Resources, expressed hope that “the discovery of the 391-carat diamond would once again alert the world to Sierra Leone’s mineral resource potential and engender a renewed interest in investing in the country’s mining sector. I am especially pleased with the transparent approach taken by the Company to determine the market value of this stone and maximize the economic distribution to all key stakeholders”.
For further information please contact:
The National Minerals Agency
New England Ville, Freetown
Tel: +232 (79) 250702
Email: info@nma.gov.sl
