5th New High Grade Copper-Gold Discovery at Minto Mine in Three Years

Capstone Mining Corp.

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5th New High Grade Copper-Gold Discovery at Minto Mine in Three Years

posted on Feb 17, 2009 02:07AM

February 17, 2009

Capstone Reports 5th New High Grade Copper-Gold Discovery at Minto Mine in Three Years

Intercept of 2.7% Cu over 26.4m, including 7.1% Cu over 4.1m, opens up Whole New Exploration Area

VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA--(Marketwire - Feb. 17, 2009) - Capstone Mining Corporation (TSX:CS) today announced the discovery of another high grade copper-gold zone at its Minto Mine in the Yukon, the 5th such discovery since acquiring the project in June 2005. The "Minto North" target, located approximately 600 metres north-northwest of the current open pit mine, yielded high grade mineralization at relatively shallow depths, similar in grade, thickness and style of mineralization to that found in the open pit, the highest grade of all the deposits identified at the Minto Mine to date. This new prospect lies directly on a linear trend that includes, from south to north: the Ridgetop, Area 2/Area 118, Main (open pit mine) deposits and now Minto North.

All three discovery drill holes intersected thick intervals of bornite-rich, high grade copper-gold mineralization. Highlights of assays from these holes are summarized in the table immediately below; while the potential significance of this new discovery is discussed following the table and the full results for all three holes are in the attached table.

Assay Highlights from Drill holes 09SWC-390; 09SWC-392 & 09SWC-393

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
            Target  From     To Interval  Interval  Copper   Gold   Silver
Hole ID     Area      (m)    (m)      (m)      (ft)     (%)  (g/t)    (g/t)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
09SWC-390  "Minto   60.6   88.7      28.1      92.2   2.59   0.59      7.1
            North"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
including           74.4   88.1      13.7      44.9   3.50   0.72     10.4
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
09SWC-392  "Minto   61.2   91.6      30.4      99.7   2.40   1.16      8.6
            North"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
including           83.9   88.5       4.6      15.1   5.00   3.13     20.4
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
09SWC-393  "Minto   54.0   80.4      26.4      86.6   2.69   1.22     10.4
            North"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
including           58.5   62.6       4.1      13.4   7.11   1.03     26.3
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

"The style of this mineralization at Minto North, including the impressive copper grades and thicknesses, is reminiscent of the current open pit at the Minto Mine," said Stephen Quin, President & COO of Capstone Mining. "The Minto North discovery marks the first success north of the DEF fault, which previously marked the northern limit of economically significant mineralization on the Minto Mine property. This discovery opens up the potential of the underexplored northern half of the Minto Mine property, an area that had largely been ignored by past explorers and has seen little exploration drilling."

The Minto Main deposit is cut-off by the DEF fault, and previous exploration back to the early 1970's had attempted to locate a continuation of mineralization north of the fault, without success. Capstone's discovery announced today, in the first drill holes of the 2009 exploration program, is a result of applying successful exploration techniques developed over the past three years south of the open pit. "Full credit for the discovery at Minto North is due to our outstanding exploration team at the Minto Mine," said Mr. Quin. "Five discoveries in three years is a testament to their tenacity and determination to pursue targets in areas previously ignored or written off by prior explorers." Further drilling at Minto North is already underway.

Minto North Target

The Minto North copper-gold discovery is a result of the careful application of geophysical and geochemical surveys, in combination with 3D geologic modelling. The Minto North target is centered on a magnetic anomaly measuring approximately 600m by 230m in aerial extent, very similar in aerial extent to the magnetic anomaly associated with the Minto Main deposit, which is currently being mined. Targeting was further refined by gradient array induced polarization (GAIP) and geochemical surveys, and geologic modelling.

The intercepts in holes 09SWC-390, -392 and -393 lie at depths of approximately 50-60m below surface, significantly shallower than most of the other high grade deposits at Minto. In the area between Minto North and Minto Main there is only one historic drill hole within 500m of these intercepts, drilled in 1974 off the edge of the principal geophysical targets.

For current drill hole locations, please view the accompanying map: http://www.capstonemining.com/

For a current view of drill results in priority areas please view the accompany map: http://www.capstonemining.com/

For a cross section from Minto North to Minto Main, please click on the following link: http://www.capstonemining.com/

Core from the new discovery at Minto North will be on display at the "Core Shack" at the Prospectors and Developers Convention in Toronto from March 1 to 4, 2009.

Quality Assurance

The technical information in this news release has been prepared in accordance with Canadian regulatory requirements set out in National Instrument 43-101 and reviewed by Stephen P. Quin, P. Geo., President & COO for Capstone Mining Corporation. The exploration activities at the Minto project site are carried out under the supervision of Brad Mercer, P. Geol., V.P. Exploration (Canada) for Capstone.

The analytical method for the copper and silver analyses is aqua regia digestion of the samples followed by atomic absorption spectroscopy. Gold is analysed by fire assay fusion with atomic absorption spectroscopy finish for gold. Analyses are carried out by ALS Chemex in North Vancouver. When visible gold is noted in drill core samples or regular fire assay values appear abnormally high, the pulp and screen metallic assay method is used to determine the total gold content and gold contents of different size fractions. This is considered industry best practice when dealing with coarse gold mineralization where a nugget effect is suspected. This determination is accepted as the most representative value and is used in the assay database for resource calculations. Blank and standard samples are used for quality assurance and quality control. Where more than two check samples assay outside expected ranges, the entire batch is re-assayed. After the completion of planned drill programs at Minto, random check assays will be carried out by Acme Analytical of Vancouver.

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