Bear Creek announces acquisition of three new precious metals prospects, Peru

Bear Creek announces acquisition of three new precious metals prospects, Peru

Bear Creek Mining announce the acquisition of 100% interests in three new gold/silver exploration targets located in southern Peru. In addition to its commitments towards advancing the Corani and Santa Ana deposits which together contain over 400 million ounces of silver in measured and indicated resources plus base metals credits, the Company continues to maintain aggressive generative exploration programs which have led to the discovery and acquisition of these prospects. The newly acquired prospects are described as follows:

The Umayo gold prospect (400 hectares), located 24 kilometers southeast of the city of Puno in southern Peru, represents an epithermal gold system contained within a volcanic setting associated with a large alteration area measuring 500 by 500 meters. Nineteen (19) preliminary rock chip samples returned values ranging from 35 to 6070 ppb gold. Highly anomalous arsenic values up to 1165 ppm indicate the presence of a shallow epithermal gold deposit. Future work will focus on detailed geologic mapping, trenching, and additional rock chip sampling.

The Tassa prospect (1200 hectares) is located 160 kilometers south east of the city of Arequipa. Tassa is an untested epithermal silver system containing large tonnage-potential, near-surface disseminated silver (plus gold) in volcanics. The geologic setting resembles the Company’s Santa Ana silver deposit, but with higher gold, arsenic, mercury and antimony values contained within even more permeable volcanoclastic host rock making Tassa a bulk-tonnage, outcropping, disseminated silver (gold) epithermal-type target. The volcanoclastics are regionally surrounded by manganese-carbonate veins in the lower sections accompanied by an increase in copper mineralization in the southern part of the claim block suggesting that zoning into a porphyry copper-gold system may be present. Eighty-seven rock chip samples returned an average of 61 ppm silver. In addition, three trenches totaling 466 meters in length have been completed with 2 meter samples returning an average of 65.4ppm silver exposed over an area 800 meters by 250 meters by 200 meters high and open laterally. Six of the rock chip samples returned anomalous gold values from 0.10 to 0.48 g/t. The Bear Creek claims are surrounded by recently-staked competitor’s mineral rights. To view location map for both the Umayo and the Tassa projects please refer to http://www.bearcreekmining.com/i/pdf/2009-04-16_NRM.pdf

A third prospect, located north of the city of Moquegua, southern Peru, is an epithermal low-sulfidation gold system where the Company is further consolidating its land position. Banded quartz veins similar to the El Penon gold deposit, Chile are common in the district. Gold anomalies in the volcanic host rock (36 rock chip samples) range from 7 to 2030 ppb Au. Anomalous arsenic obtained from outcrops within the district strongly indicates the presence of additional, hidden veins. Brecciated and strongly fractured volcanics measuring 50 meters in width surrounding the veins indicate potential for a disseminated gold target. Outcrops are sparse within the potentially mineralized area; therefore, this target has remained unrecognized and untested. Future plans include 2-3 trenches (50 meters length minimum) in the brecciated volcanics to evaluate bulk target potential in addition to the higher-grade gold vein targets.

Andrew Swarthout, President and CEO, stated “These acquisitions represent our continued commitment towards generative exploration which has been the foundation for Bear Creek’s success in discovering both the Corani and Santa Ana deposits. We anticipate that at least one of these acquisitions will be brought to the drill stage during 2009. The current market down-turn is continuing to free up opportunities and Bear Creek’s exploration teams remain vigilant for opportunities to acquire additional high-quality precious metals prospects.”

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