announcement out

ASX ANNOUNCEMENT ASX CODE: CTP
08 December 2010
TO: The Manager, Company Announcements ASX Limited
CONTACT: John Heugh +61 8 9474 1444
SURPRISE-1 (EP-115) FURTHER OIL SHOWS LOWER STAIRWAY
Central Petroleum Limited (ASX:CTP) (Central), as Operator has pleasure in
providing this drilling update for the Surprise-1 well.
Prior to the recent incident which has forced a suspension of drilling operations, a core
was cut and successfully retrieved from 2546.2 2554.4m.RT (depth from rotary
table). Preliminary well site observation has determined that most of the core showed
100% moderately bright yellow natural fluorescence with a slow streaming weak pale
blue blooming to diffuse cut and a moderately thin to thick pale blue residual ring. The
majority of the core appeared to be sandstone with a trace of siltstone, very fine
grained to coarse grained with a well developed siliceous cement, rare matrix, very
poor to tight visual porosity and occasional fair to good secondary porosity.
Major fractures were recorded in the zones 2547 2550m and 2551 2554m. The first
zone showed an abundance of light brown free oil with black sticky oil in the deeper
zone.
The core will undergo detailed routine and special core analysis to determine oil
saturation and other reservoir characteristics.
The Lower Stairway Sandstone is the first primary target in the well. The top of the
Stairway Sandstone had been interpreted at a TVD of 2,450m, some 131m higher than
prognosed.
A summary of the Surprise-1 Prospect is as follows:
Prognosed Objectives: Stairway Sandstone (at 2581m RT) and Pacoota Sandstone
(at 2694m RT) formations
Primary target size: 50 million bbls oil initially in place at high estimate
Location: Longitude 23 degrees, 42 minutes 50.758 seconds South and Latitude 129
degrees 59 minutes 36.091 seconds East
Should hydrocarbons be discovered, and the wireline logging results are positive, it is
planned to evaluate the reservoir by conducting a flow test or tests.
Central will continue to update the market on Surprise-1 drilling operations as more
significant information comes to hand.
John Heugh
Managing Director
Central Petroleum Limited