Oyster Oil Commences 3350 line kilometers of Airborne Survey in Djibouti

Oyster Oil and Gas Ltd has commenced an airborne survey in the Republic of Djibouti which is being conducted by Bridgeporth Holdings Ltd, a UK based specialist geophysical contractor.

The survey consists of a high density gravity and magnetics airborne survey over some 3,350 line kilometres onshore and offshore in southern Djibouti; the survey acquisition is scheduled for completion in January 2016.

Bridgeporth Holdings contract includes the processing and inversion studies of the data later in 2016.

According to Oyster Oil head of exploration Dr Phil Roach the survey will aid the understanding of structural development of the working petroleum system in Djibouti.

“This survey will be an important addition to the Djibouti hydrocarbon dataset and will aid our understanding of structural development of the working petroleum system in Djibouti. We believe that this high quality survey will enable Oyster to identify optimum areas for further exploration work prior to making any drilling decisions,” says  Dr Phil.

Djibouti is at an early stage in terms of exploration activities for hydrocarbons with limited amount of data despite increased exploration activity in East Africa and Yemen.

Oyster holds four production sharing contracts interests (Block 1, 2, 3 and 4) with the Government of Djibouti comprising approximately an area of 14,100 km² (3.5 million acres) onshore and offshore in Djibouti.

Block 1 is located primarily onshore and extends into the shallow water of the Gulf of Aden in the southeastern part of the country bordering Ethiopia and Somaliland while Block 2 is located onshore in the north of the country bordering Eritrea.

Also onshore is Block 4 to the South West bordering Ethiopia where Oyster is targeting the Mesozoic sedimentary basin which is thought to underlie the extensive covering of Tertiary volcanic rocks. There is strong evidence for an active petroleum system in the general area with oil seeps recorded to the south and east in Ethiopia and Somaliland respectively, and the large and prolific Jurassic oil fields in Yemen offer potential analogues.

Block 3 lies offshore northern Djibouti in the Red Sea which is over 1600km long and 360km wide. Further north include oil and gas producing countries such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Sudan all in the Red Sea Basin. Oyster is thus targeting a possible extension of the Red Sea Basin into the Block.

Oyster signed a production sharing contract (PSC) in September 2011 with the government of the Republic of Djibouti with an effective date following the decree of 1st March 2012.