Categories: Base Metals
Topics: General Base Metals

Hannan Metals (TSX-V: HAN) CEO Michael Hudson on Shifting Focus to the Seismic-Defined Kilmurry Target at the Clare Zinc Project in Ireland

Gerardo Del Real: This is Gerardo Del Real with Resource Stock Digest. Joining me today is the Chairman and CEO of Hannan Metals (TSX-V: HAN)(OTC: HANNF), Mr. Michael Hudson. Mike, I know you're on the road. Thank you for taking time today, I appreciate it.

Michael Hudson: Always a pleasure, Gerardo.

Gerardo Del Real: Let's get right to it, Mike. You had some new earlier this morning, you completed drilling at Ballyhickey and you also defined a significant zinc target at Kilmurry. Now, let's be absolutely clear the better management teams in the space know when to cut their losses. Hannan, yourself, everybody at the company has been very clear about the fact that you're looking for a big system. You drilled three holes, you found lots of smoke. We're not in this for smoke, so you're pivoting to another excellent target. Can we talk about why the pivot and why you're excited about Kilmurry?

Michael Hudson: Well you basically summarized it, Gerardo. We drilled three holes over a big system at surface that we saw at Ballyhickey. So a pretty preliminary test but we did drill the best parts of that system from what we knew about it from the seismics. And basically that dog didn't hunt is what we say. Having duds in exploration, if you want to put it crudely, is a normal outcome. We don't hit in every hole, and the last thing we want to do in exploration is prove something is not there.

So in this market the zinc explore companies are not getting a lot of love as we all know. With scarce funds especially but really always, you want to be drilling your best targets, and we had high hopes for Ballyhickey without a doubt, but it didn't work out as well as we expected or hoped. But that of course is mutually exclusive to any other targets on the property and that's a big property and there's no shortage of targets.

We're moving to a target that is actually – and we've done a lot of seismic work as you're aware – this is our strongest geological target. It is deeper at Kilmurry but we can test it cheaply with an extension of one drill hole and we can drill it for a few hundred meters. This is actually a hands down system that has developed there. Now let's see if it develops the base metals at the right level, but it's got all of the hallmarks of being something transformatively if that's the correct word, and that's the only thing that will get recognition in this market.

Gerardo Del Real: And let's be clear this target wasn't drilled first, not because it's not a great target but because it is further down at depth, where the Ballyhickey targets were a bit shallower. Am I accurate in stating it that way?

Michael Hudson: It's two-fold, you're completely correct. First up we went for the shallower target because that was an easier and cheaper test. And of course finding something shallower is a better outcome. But this Kilmurry target has really developed over the last three months.

We went back and reprocessed some of the seismics and re-logged some of the drill holes. So you'll see in the summary of what we wanted to drill that we put out a few months ago, Kilmurry wasn't even talked about at that stage because it hadn't been pulled together. So it's a relatively new target, and it's leapfrogged some of the other targets that we had planned to drill. So it's a big area. We're only testing one part of it, but again we think we're testing a pretty good part of it and at a cost effective way for shareholders.

Gerardo Del Real: Now you mentioned how big the land package is. It truly is district scale. Now this target is 9 kilometers south of the Kilbricken resource, correct?

Michael Hudson: It is, indeed.

Gerardo Del Real: Fantastic, we're expecting permits within the next couple of months. Is that accurate?

Michael Hudson: Indeed again. The issues around permitting have been sorted out in Ireland. We had went through a hiatus there with the Ballyhickey area, but all those issues have been resolved from a legislative point of view in Ireland. There is a little bit of a backlog and we anticipate the permits to come through in the new year.

Gerardo Del Real: Fantastic. I hope I can have you back on once drilling commences. Any news between now and then, again I hope that I can have you back on and thank you so much for providing an update. Again, I know you are on the road so I appreciate it, Mike.

Michael Hudson: The good and the bad, Gerardo. It's always important to communicate.

Gerardo Del Real: Absolutely, it's appreciated. Thank you.

Michael Hudson: Thank you, Gerardo.