The drill stem test, which was run for two hours yesterday over the basal Birkhead/top Hutton interval at a depth of 1622-1636m, recovered 18.5 barrels of oil and 21.4 bbls of water, according to joint venture partners Beach Petroleum and Cooper Energy.

This result implied a daily flow rate of 202 bbls of oil and 233 bbls of water, the Perth-based company said.

Last Friday, Cooper announced that the first drill stem test conducted in the uppermost Namur Sandstone flowed an equivalent 859 bbls of oil per day, with 340 bbls of water.

Silver Sands-1 was drilled into a small structural close, about 1.5km south-east of the Christies oil field, which has so far produced 800,000 bbls of oil.

The rig will now move to the Sellicks-2 well location, also in PEL92.

PEL 92 joint venture partners are Beach Petroleum (75%) and Cooper Energy (25%).