Key points
- Marine & Coastal Geoscience (Pty) Ltd. of South Africa conducted the survey and identified at least 17 sites in six areas with potential for diamond entrapment.
- Block B covers 269 square kilometres with a 43-kilometre coastline, extending five to eight kilometres seaward in water depths from the surf zone to about 45 metres.
- Marine & Coastal collected 830-line kilometres of high-resolution geophysical data covering six major geomorphological features, including Black Cliffs, Easter Point, Central Reef, Sylvia Reef system, St. Francis Bay deposit and St. Francis scarp.
- Afri-Can is designing a target-driven prospecting program in three phases, with the initial sampling program layout to be completed by mid-August.
Afri-Can Marine Minerals has received positive results from a marine geophysical survey, of Block B licence area, located north of Luderitz, Namibia. The geophysical survey conducted by Marine & Coastal Geoscience (Pty) Ltd., of South Africa (Marine & Coastal), identified at least 17 sites present in six areas, with potential for diamond entrapment. Marine & Coastal has recommended a sampling program in order to determine the geology of each site and consequently prove the presence of diamonds.
Block B, measuring 269 square kilometres, has a 43-kilometre-long coastline and extends from the coastline seaward to between five kilometres and eight kilometres with water depths ranging from the surf zone to about 45 metres below sea level. Marine & Coastal collected 830-line kilometres of high-resolution geophysical data. The interpretation of the bathymetric, seismic and sonographic data reveals the presence of six major geomorphological features that could be indicative of the presence of diamondiferous deposits:
Black Cliffs — identification of five prospective areas, including several features associated with reefs.
Easter Point — occurrence of a near-shore basement drop-off feature and at least four secondary-sized basinal sedimentary assemblages.
Central reef — identification of two reefs with one extending from shore to 27-metre water depths and two sedimentary deposits with the shallowest occurring in 10- to 17-metre water depths.
Sylvia Reef system — occurrence of a reef system extending for six kilometres from shore to 20-metre water depths.
St. Francis bay deposit — occurrence of an offshore sedimentary deposit occurring in water depths between 21 metres and 25 metres.
St. Francis scarp — presence of a scarp traceable for a distance of 33 kilometres.
Afri-Can Marine Minerals is currently designing a target-driven prospecting program in order to identify diamond resource areas for further development. The prospecting program will be implemented in three phases: initial sampling, follow-up sampling and mine evaluation sampling. The initial sampling program layout will be completed by the middle of August. Subsequently, the contractor will be named and the sampling schedule will be determined with the contractor. Shareholders will be kept advised of the developments.
Block B lies on the northern boundary of the known rich diamondiferous deposits currently being mined along the south and central Namibian West Coast. To the south, an inferred resource exceeding 4.25 million carats has been estimated for the region between Halifax and Mercury islands.
