Afri-Can Marine Minerals Corp. will start its diamond sampling program on the EPL 3403 marine diamond concession in Namibia on or about March 25, 2011. The aims of the program are to start delineating the diamond potential of the southern portion of EPL 3403 and to prove diamond presence and find areas of diamond concentration in the northern region. The program is planned to last between 25 days and 30 days.
The program is designed to extract a minimum of 250 samples of five square metres each. A minimum of 185 samples will be taken in the southern area, within which five separate targets have been delineated. The southern targets cover an area of about 23 square kilometres. A minimum of 65 samples will be extracted in the northern region, which has been divided into three targets covering an area of about 350 square kilometres.
Previous sampling programs recovered 33 diamonds weighing 14.07 carats from 24 positive samples in the southern region. Of the diamonds, 15 per cent were larger than one carat and the four largest weighed 1.15 carats, 1.17 carats, 1.73 carats and 2.69 carats, respectively. Multiple stones were found in five samples, one of which contained six diamonds.
In target 1 in the southern region the samples will be spaced 125 metres apart on lines spaced at 250 metres and 250 metres apart on lines spaced at 500 metres in targets 2 and 3. In the remaining targets in the south the samples will be spaced 500 metres apart on lines spaced at 500 metres. The sampling program will be carried out by the vessel mv DP the Explorer, a dedicated sampling vessel, which can sample down to depth of 200 metres and can extract up to 21 samples per day. The sample size is five square metres, and the tool can sample down to 12 metres below the sea floor.
EPL 3403 covers approximately 800 square kilometres and is adjacent to the north of the Atlantic One mining lease (ML) 47 (owned by Namdeb Diamond Corp. (Pty.) Ltd., a 50:50 partnership between the government of the Republic of Namibia and De Beers Centenary AG), which is the largest marine diamond deposit in the world. ML 47 is currently producing in excess of 1.1 million carats per year.
Richard Foster is responsible for the technical part of this news release and is the designated qualified person under the terms of National Instrument 43-101.
