TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – TSX-V-listed explorer Pangolin Diamonds on Wednesday announced that it had discovered what it believes to be one of the largest-ever kimberlite pipes in the world at its Tsabong North project, in Botswana.

The company said it had modelled the kimberlite at 270 ha, making it comparable with the Se251 kimberlite in Angola that measures 220 ha, the MK1 kimberlite in Botswana that measures 180 ha, and the Mwadui kimberlite in Tanzania, which measures 146 ha.

The new discovery stemmed from Pangolin’s discovery earlier this year of two kimberlites, Magi-01 and Magi-02, at the project. These kimberlites were found to be part of a single intrusive complex, after the company submitted aeromagnetic data for an independent National Instrument 43-101-compliant review by South Africa-based Xcalibur Airborne Geophysics, of Pretoria.

Based on these observations, Pangolin drilled a new hole between the Magi-01 and Magi-02 kimberlites. The new hole intersected the same sandy tuffs recognised in the two previous drill holes, confirming that the Magi-kimberlite was a single, large body and not two smaller kimberlites, as previously believed.

The Magi-kimberlite had now been confirmed over a distance of 1 200 m in an east-west direction. The average depth at which the crater facies sediments were intersected was about 35 m. The depths of intersection of the sandy tuffs vary between 55.3 m and 61.5 m.

Pangolin said further work would start shortly, with seven additional holes laid out for core drilling to determine the final size of the Magi-kimberlite. Each hole would intersect at least 100 m of kimberlite to recover any additional indicator minerals, and any diamonds. 

“The geophysical models available to Pangolin strongly suggest the potential for discovering additional very large kimberlites in the Tsabong North project area,” Pangolin chairperson Dr Leon Daniels said.