See the Nearly 1,000-Carat Diamond Lucara Just Dug Up

Vancouver—Lucara Diamond Corp. is sharing its latest large diamond recovery, and this one’s a big one.

The Vancouver, Canada-headquartered mining company recovered a 998-carat diamond from its Karowe mine in Botswana, it announced this week.

The unbroken, high white clivage diamond measures 67 millimeters by 49 millimeters by 45 millimeters.

This year, Lucara has dug up 31 diamonds weighing over 100 carats from Karowe, including 10 weighing over 200 carats and two weighing over 500 carats. (The second largest diamond recovery of the year so far is the 549-carat Sethunya, which is to be cut by HB Antwerp and sold by Louis Vuitton.)

The 998-carat find is from the Karowe’s South Lobe, EM/PK(S) unit and was preceded by several other large recoveries in the area: a 273-carat, 105-carat, 83-carat, 73-carat and 69-carat diamond.

Lucara called the specific area “an important economic driver for the proposed underground mine” in a press release.

The stone was discovered in MDR or “Mega Diamond Recovery” XRT circuit, which allows diamond recovery after the primary crushing phase but before milling.

CEO Eira Thomas said: “Lucara is extremely pleased with the continued recovery of large high-quality diamonds from the South Lobe of the Karowe mine. To recover two +500 carat diamonds in 10 months along with the many other high quality diamonds across all the size ranges is a testament to the unique aspect of the resource at Karowe and the mine's ability to recover these large and rare diamonds.”

She continued, “Operations at Karowe have continued through 2020 and operational challenges, due to COVID-19 restrictions, have been met with professionalism by the team. We look forward to a safe finish to 2020 and continued success at Karowe as we remain focused on strong operations to ensure maximum resource performance."

Just as HB Antwerp is cutting the Sethunya, which Lucara recovered from Karowe in February this year, it will cut the new nearly 1,000-carat diamond per a partnership in which the former buys all diamonds from the latter in 2020 weighing more than 10.8 carats.

HB Antwerp’s Communications and External Affairs Director, Margaux Donckier, who joined the company recently, said: “This exceptional diamond of 998 carats, measuring 67x49x45 mm, will be analyzed, planned and cut in Antwerp. 

“Over the past few months, HB Antwerp has developed special technology to measure, laser and analyze these exceptionally large diamonds. This technology comes in handy right away.”