Montero completes drilling at Tumbili target, intersects over 250 metres at 0.6% TREO

Montero Mining and Exploration (CVE:MON) announced Thursday it completed its 1,525-metre drill campaign at the Tumbili target on its 60% owned Wigu Hill rare earth element (REE) property in Tanzania, and intersected over 250 metres grading 0.6% total rare earth oxides (TREO).

The Wigu Hill property, which covers an area of 142 square kilometres, is about 170 kilometres south-west of Dar es Salaam.

The Tumbili target was drilled on the southeast side of the Wigu Hill property, where drilling uncovered a larger zone of mineralized carbonatite breccia, or rock. While individual samples on these breccias have returned high-grade TREO values, reconnaisance sampling, and sampling from the firs trenches on the lower slopes of the rock returned even better values.

Assays from the Lower Tumbili zone returned lower grades, as in hole BH TUM002, which returned 0.61% TREO over a total of 253.8 metres, but expressed the potential for bulk tonnage.

Hole BH TUM001, also on the Lower Tumbili target, returned 0.702% TREO over a total of 200.4 metres, including 12.0 metres grading 2.97% TREO.

Assays from the deeper holes on the Upper Tumbili target, including from the deepest hole drilled, BH TUM004, have not yet been received.

President and CEO, Dr. Tony Harwood stated: "We are delighted with the results of this drilling which confirms the presence of a wide zone of lower grade rare earth bearing bastnaesite mineralization."

"This is considered to form a part of the core carbonatite intrusive in the central and eastern part of the Wigu Hill complex, where it is associated with the higher grade carbonatite mineralization at Twiga, Tembo and the newly discovered Nyati targets," he continued.

"Continuous mineralization . . . indicate the potential for a sizeable REE mineralized system at Wigu Hill."

The continuity of the eastern-trending carbonatite breccias on the Tumbili target have been confirmed by mapping, trenching and drilling, Montero said.

In other news, the company announced its Nyati target has been identified to the north of the Upper Tumbili target, and has been traced to an area over 800 metres along strike, and 400 metres in width. It remains open both along strike and in width.

This Nyati target will be the focus of the next stage of exploration and core drilling at Wigu Hill, Montero said.

The junior miner, which is focused on exploration and development of rare earth metals, has deposits in Tanzania, Canada and South Africa.

Rare earth elements, a group of 15 metals, are critical in the advancement of emerging green technologies and high-tech applications from electric and hybrid vehicles, wind and hydro power turbines, LCD screens, MRI and x-ray machines to MP3 Players, microphones, mobile devices and more.

On the TSX-Venture, Montero's shares shed 7.14%, trading at $0.52 as of 10:15 am EDT.