Test Drilling Planned at Only Public Diamond Mine in U.S.

The nation’s only public diamond mine, which yields about 1,400 gems a year to tourists, will be opened to test drilling by four private mining companies in a plan criticized by environmentalists.

The exploratory drilling at Crater of Diamonds State Park could lead to commercial mining at the park, which now allows anyone with the $3-a-day price of admission to seek a fortune in the soft blue-gray soil.

The state Parks, Recreation and Travel Commission voted, 12 to 0, in favor of the plan recently. If commercially viable deposits are found, the state could award mining rights to one of the four companies cooperating in the test drilling.

The Sierra Club and the Friends of the Crater of Diamonds oppose the plan and have threatened legal action to block the exploratory work. They say businesses do not belong in state parks and warn that the drilling could open the way to logging or gravel mining in the area.

The decision to allow exploratory drilling came more than 2 1/2 years after Gov. Bill Clinton appointed a Diamond Mining Advisory Task Force to study the prospect of commercial mining at the park.

An advisory team will meet by mid-January, said John Morgan, a consulting engineer who advised the state. Drilling could begin as early as April.

The state got control of the 888-acre park in southwestern Arkansas in 1972 after a private mining company went bankrupt. Visitors are allowed to prospect in a 35-acre plowed field, and people reportedly have taken away diamonds as large as 40 carats.

About 78,000 people try their luck at Crater of Diamonds each year.

An independent contractor selected under state bidding procedures will conduct the tests, working for the state and the four mining companies.

The four companies are Kennecott Inc. of Salt Lake City; Capricorn Diamonds of West Perth, Australia; Continental Diamonds, which is controlled by a Canadian gold company called Galactic Resources Ltd., and Arkansas Diamond Development Co.