News from StockwatchRhonda confirms De Beers' spring program on Knife pipe
Rhonda Corp RDM
Shares issued 22,406,159 Mar 2 close $0.39
Mon 5 Mar 2001 News Release
Mr. Robert d'Artois reports
De Beers Canada will be commencing its spring program on the Knife pipe in
April. The kimberlite pipe was initially tested by De Beers in spring
drilling last year and was established as large by Canadian standards
(possibly 10 acres), and significantly diamondiferous. Representative
samples totalling 397 kiligrams were tested in the fall and yielded 217
diamonds including nine macrodiamonds.
De Beers plans to begin the 2001 program with a ground magnetic and
electromagnetic survey over the area containing the pipe to help establish
the pipe size and to select drill hole sites. This will be followed
immediately by HQ (63.5 milimetre diametre) core drilling using a Boart
Longyear LF-70 rig. A minimum of five holes are planned. The program is
designed to delineate the size and the internal structure of the Knife pipe
and provide additional information on diamond content.
The Knife pipe is situated on a 1024-hectare (2530-acre) claim in Nunavut,
approximately 80 kilometres south of the Coronation Gulf. Rhonda owns the
property 100 per cent and has granted De Beers the option to earn a
70-per-cent interest by expending $10-million on the claim. Rhonda will
retain a 30-per-cent interest carried to production.
The discovery of the Knife diamondiferous pipe by De Beers and nearby
discoveries by other companies have focused attention on the area. Rhonda
recently undertook additional staking, expanding its 100-per-cent owned
Inulik property to over 80,000 acres. Rhonda's plans for its 2001 program
on the Inulik property include glacial till sampling, prospecting and
airborne geophysics. Rhonda has already reworked existing geophysical and
geochemical data from the area and identified a number of potential
kimberlite anomalies on the Inulik property.