History's Second Largest Diamond Found

Lucara President and CEO William Lamb said the 1,111-carat diamond workers found Monday at the company’s Karowe Mine is “slightly smaller than a tennis ball.” This picture provided by Lucara shows how big the diamond is when compared to a loupe. The 1,111-carat Type IIa diamond is the second-largest gem-quality diamond ever found. Only the 3,106-carat Cullinan Diamond, which was discovered in January 1905 at the Premier mine in South Africa and later cleaved by Joseph Asscher, is bigger.

Workers recovered the stone in the mine’s south lobe, an area that has produced three 300-carat-plus rough diamonds this year (including a 342-carat stone that Lucara sold in July for $20.5 million). As to estimating the value of this amazing stone Lucara Diamond Corp. President and CEO William Lamb saidthat is is “almost impossible” to estimate a sale price for the stone, or what it could yield in terms of polished diamonds.