Pele mountain reports significant diamond finds: Bulk sample represents "huge advancement" toward determining presence of commercial diamonds. (Mining).

It has been a groundbreaking year for Pele Mountain Resources Inc. with three significant diamond finds in the Wawa area, north of Sault Ste. Marie.

The Toronto-based mining exploration and development company is anxiously awaiting the results from a 150-tonne bulk sample mined from their more advanced Cristal diamond occurrence situated on their Festival property, 25 kilometres north of Wawa.

DeBeers Canada processed the sample at their Grand Prairie, Alta. concentrate plant prior to shipping the contents inside sealed containers to South Africa where any diamonds will be recovered.

Pele president A1 Shefsky says neither they nor DeBeers are aware of the diamond content at this time, but they hope to know by mid-December at the latest. The diamonds taken from the sample will be sent to The Diamond Trading Company in London for further evaluation of their quality.

"We're sitting on the edge of our seats waiting for the results," says Shefsky.

September was breakthrough month for Pele, which announced three diamond discoveries - known as the Cristal, Dom Perignon and Pol Roger occurrences - at Festival where they control a 100 per cent interest in the mineral rights. They also own two gold projects near Wawa and west of Thunder Bay.

"This year was such a quantum leap in understanding the potential of these occurrences to become a mine," says Shefsky, whose company acquired the property in two phases last year and during the spring. "This season was really the turning point, and the work being lone up there looks really encouraging."

Shefsky says they have identified a number of diamond-rich volcanic complexes, but are targeting their efforts on three occurrences, due to their size and ease of access, located on the southern portion of their 101-square-kilometre property. Pele built a road in September up to Cristal and has conducted mechanical stripping, detailed mapping and additional surface sampling.

" We wanted to find out as much as we could before the snow came, and to continue with an active (exploration) program."

The bulk sample taken in October represents a "huge advancement" toward determining the presence of commercial-sized diamonds," says Shefsky.

"We know all these volcanic complexes e diamond-bearing, and we've done enough sampling to know they're all very encouraging. We're really moving thinks along."

They have invested more than $1 million at Festival this year and next year's exploration budget only stands to grow, based on their initial results, Shefsky says

"The size of the complexes hosting the diamonds is very big," with a surface width greater than 100 metres, "which is huge," along a strike length greater than half a kilometre, says Shefsky.

"You're talking the potential of some really large tonnage. The distribution of the size of the microdiamonds is very encouraging and it's shown good potential for larger diamonds."

Recent diamond finds by Pele and their neighbour, Band-Ore Resources, have created a real buzz in the community, says Shefsky, because these finds are attracting interest from major mining companies like DeBeers and Kennecott Canada. The latter recently signed a financing and management deal with Band-Ore.

Pele has no joint agreement with DeBeers, though the South African mining giant has shown interest by agreeing to process their bulk sample.

Both companies are extracting samples from the 2.7-billion-year-old heterolithic breccia rock around Wawa, long believed to hold diamonds. Most of the samples discovered came from surface outcroppings.

"We found these (occurences) by doing old-fashioned prospecting in peeling back the moss. They're easy to find if you know what you're looking for."

Compared to other, more remote, diamond-bearing areas in Canada such as the Northwest Territories and James Bay, Shefsky says Wawa has many advantages in its favour with its highway access, local mining experience and relatively low cost of development.

"There's more activity in this area with other companies raising money and doing work, and there's a real good chance this area is going to heat up and become the hotbed of activity."