Alrosa found a 236-carat color rough diamond in North Yakutia. This is the largest color diamond ever mined in Russia, the Russian diamond producer reports on Friday.
“The diamond was extracted from the Ebelyakh mine in Yakutia, Russia. This is the largest natural color rough diamond ever found in Russia,” the company says.
The rough diamond is of intense yellow-brown color. Its sizes are 47x24x22 mm. According to a preliminary estimate, it is 120-230 million years old, Alrosa says.
“Such a large natural color rough diamond is a unique discovery. Now, the stone is at Alrosa’s United Selling Organization being studied and evaluated by our specialists. After that, we will decide whether to give it to our manufacturers for cutting or sell it as a rough. Of course, cutters in any country will be interested in such a diamond, as it has the potential to give several high quality polished diamonds,” Pavel Vinikhin, the head of Diamonds of Alrosa cutting and polishing division, said in a comment.
Source: TASS
Header: VLADIVOSTOK, RUSSIA DECEMBER 27, 2017: A worker at the KGK DV diamond cutting factory operated by KGK Group. The factory is expected to cut up to 9,000 carats of rough diamonds supplied by the Alrosa diamond mining company per month. Yuri Smityuk/TASS
Notes:
Alrosa will become the world’s largest producer of color diamonds worldwide after closure of Rio Tinto’s Argyle mine, Director of Alrosa’s cutting branch Pavel Vinikhin told TASS in an interview.
MOSCOW, RUSSIA NOVEMBER 26, 2018: Pictured in this photo illustration are cut diamonds at Diamonds Alrosa, a cutting and polishing division of Russia’s diamond manufacturer Alrosa. Alexander Ryumin/TASS
Alrosa digs up record-breaking, 800-mln year-old diamond
The gemstone has an unusual structure, with one diamond freely moving inside the other one. The gem therefore looks like a traditional nesting doll. This unique diamond is the first of its kind ever in the industry’s history, specialists say.
© Alrosa Press Service
Despite its complex structure, the diamond’s weight is just 0.62 carats, Alrosa reported. The space of the inner cavity is 6 cubic millimeters and the weight of the diamond nesting inside is 0.02 carats.
Alrosa mines diamonds in the Sakha (Yakutia) and Arkhangelsk Regions. In 2018, the mining giant produced more than 36.6 million carats of gemstones, while selling more than 38 million carats. In addition, the producer rang up $4.5 bln in sales revenues.
Argyle is operating in Australia since 1983 and is the world’s largest deposit of natural color diamonds. The mine is scheduled for shutdown at the turn of 2020 in view of depletion, according to Rio Tinto.
“Considering the closure of Argyle mine in Australia, we will become the world’s largest producer of color diamonds and can therefore go after leadership on the color diamond market. We have assets rich with color diamonds – Severalmaz and Diamonds of Anabar,” Vinikhin said. A pink and a yellow diamonds comprised in The Spectacle collection were found on deposits of these companies, he added.