AIM-listed Afren has reported that operator Hunt Oil has made a significant oil discovery in the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq with its Simrit-2 exploration well drilled on the Ain Sifni block.
Afren said that the high impact Simrit-2 discovery was verified with both wireline logs and sidewall core sampling. It said that the objective of the well was to test the western extent of the Simrit anticline.
Preliminary analysis of data collected during and following drilling indicates that the well has encountered an estimated 409m of net oil pay in Cretaceous, Jurassic, and Triassic age reservoirs (an estimated 312m of this pay is interpreted as containing light oil).
No oil-water contact was established in the target reservoirs and there is speculation that Ain Sifni is contiguous with the giant multi-billion barrel Shaikan discovery made by Gulf Keystone and which continues to be appraised.