De Beers Cancels Snap Lake Winter Shutdown

A planned four-week shutdown of De Beers' Canadian Snap Lake Mine in December has been canceled. The company decided last year to scale back production and on summer and winter production shutdowns at Snap Lake Mine in response to the worldwide economic slowdown.

"This is a good news decision in response to some positive trends we are seeing in the market place," said Jim Gowans, president & CEO of De Beers Canada Inc. "While we are optimistic about the improvements we are seeing in the global industry, we will continue to make decisions carefully with a focus on the long term success for our new Canadian mines."

Before the summer shutdown, the mine achieved a milestone, surpassing 2 million hours worked without a "lost time injury." During the summer shutdown at team of approximately 60 staff provided care and maintenance for the camp and successfully completed summer environmental monitoring—requirements for environmental compliance.

Snap Lake Mine is De Beers' first mine in Canada and the only Canadian diamond mine that is completely underground. De Beers has another diamond mine in Canada, Victor, located in Ontario.