One of South Africa’s biggest diamond mines, the Cullinan, has churned out yet another sizable rare diamond. This week Petra Diamonds Ltd announced the discovery of the 20.08 carat, Type IIb rare blue diamond.
Mostly, blue diamonds are Type IIb and account for only 0.1% of the world’s colour diamonds. Due to their rarity, the blue diamond is quickly snatched up by collectors and investors.
There has been no forecast of the price but you can expect it to fetch a few million dollars because of the blue gem quality of the stone.
This is not the first big stone brought to the surface at the mine this year. In April a 424.89 carat stone was unearthed. Within a month the diamond was sold for a whopping $15-million (R223.4-million).
More famously, the Cullinan mine made history in 1905 when the largest rough gem diamond ever found at 3.106 carats was dug up. This was cut into two diamonds which now forms part of the British Crown Jewels.
Picture: Petra Diamonds Ltd
