Brooking Recovery Boosts Lucapa Shares

RAPAPORT... Shares in Lucapa Diamond Company jumped more than 8% Tuesdayafter the miner said testing at its exploration project yielded "exceptional"results. The miner recovered 1,100 diamonds - including 18 macrodiamondsand 1,082 micro stones - from the Brooking, Little Spring Creek, asset located nearthe Ellendale mine in Western Australia. "The latest microdiamond [stones less than 0.5 millimetersin diameter] results from Little Spring Creek are some of the best I have seenin the diamond space," said managing director Stephen Wetherall. "To recover1,100 micro and macrodiamonds from a 178-kilogram sample from a single drillhole is remarkable." Additionally, a helicopter survey Lucapa conducted identified11 new target locations containing lamproite, including a seven-hectare areawhere the miner previously recovered 20 diamonds during a stream-sampling test. The Brooking asset is located 50 kilometers from theEllendale mine, famous for its fancy-color yellow diamonds. Lucapa, which owns 80% of Brooking, with Leopold DiamondCompany owning the remaining 20%, saw its share price rise 8.5% on theAustralia Stock Exchange. Trading of the stock was suspended on Monday inanticipation of the announcement. In addition to Brooking, Lucapa owns the Lulo mine in Angola, as well as the Mothae project in Lesotho and the Orapa asset in Botswana. Image: Diamonds recovered from Brooking mine