St. Elias Mines Ltd.; Strawberry Flats Gold Project, B.C.

08/05/2010 [ACCESSWIRE]

Vancouver, B.C. August 3, 2010 Lori McClenahan, President of St. Elias Mines Ltd. (SLI – TSX:V) (“St. Elias”), is pleased to provide the following update with respect to the Strawberry Flats Gold Project (the "Property") located in south-central British Columbia.

Strawberry Flats Property Agreement

The TSX Venture Exchange has accepted for filing the option agreement (the “Agreement”) between St. Elias and Dorex Minerals Inc. (“Dorex”) whereby Dorex has acquired from St. Elias options to earn up to an 80% interest, subject to a 1.5% NSR, in the Property.

Under the terms of the Agreement, Dorex can acquire an initial 60% interest, subject to a 1.5% NSR in the Property in consideration of:

(a) making cash payments of $50,827 to St. Elias over a two-year period;

(b) issuing 600,000 common shares in the capital of Dorex to St. Elias over a two-year period; and

(c) incurring $600,000 in exploration expenditures on the Property over a three-year period.

Dorex can elect to earn a further 20% interest in the Property in consideration of making additional cash payments of $200,000 to St. Elias, issuing an additional 600,000 common shares in the capital stock of Dorex to St. Elias and incurring an additional $1,000,000 in exploration expenditures on the Property.

In addition, Dorex shall have the right to purchase one-half of the 1.5% NSR from St. Elias for the sum of $1,500,000 up until the earlier of either 10 years from the date of the Agreement or one year from the completion of a total of 10,000 tonnes of bulk sampling, thereby reducing the NSR payable to the Option from 1.5% to 0.75%.

Strawberry Flats Exploration Program

St. Elias has been advised by Dorex that it has received final approval from British Columbia Ministry of Mines to carry out its 2010 summer exploration program on the Strawberry Flats Gold Project located in Southern British Columbia, approximately 17 kilometres northwest of the historic Rossland Mining Camp.

Dorex’s 2010 exploration program is designed to locate drill targets for a Phase II diamond drilling program. Phase I work will include confirmation and expansion of historical work from the Property including extending a trenching program completed by Cameco. In addition, Dorex plans to expand the historic soil grids on the Property and collect approximately 1,000 soil samples on a 50 x 50 metre systematic grid followed by mechanized trenching on historic and any newly generated geochemical anomalies to generate Phase II drill targets.

Strawberry Flats Gold Property

The Property, is comprised eight mineral claims covering 2,956.1 hectares (7,390 acres), located north (approximately 17 kilometres) of the historic Rossland Gold Camp which produced over 2,700,000 ounces of gold between 1897 and the early 1940's.

Historical work on the Property included a small trenching program completed by Cameco in 1989. The program was designed to determine the bedrock source of gold in soil anomalies in an area within the Strawberry Flats Gold Project. Cameco's Trench #5 returned 12 metres of 7.04 g/t Au including 2 metres of 39.16 grams per tonne (“g/t”) Au with 6.55 g/t Ag from continuous 1 metre long chip samples. Cameco's report indicates that the 7 metre wide WNW trending mineralized structure exposed in Trench #5 is of sufficient grade to warrant follow-up along strike in both directions and at depth.

The Strawberry Flats Gold Project adjoins the Jumping Josephine gold project owned by Astral Mining Corp. and Kootenay Gold Inc. Drilling results from Astral on the Jumping Josephine main zone have included 10 metres of 9.95 g/t Au and eight metres of 8.31 g/t gold. In addition, Astral Mining Corp. has announced new geochemical anomalies discovered from its 2009, 4,600 soil sampling program on the Jumping Josephine project. As with Trench #5 at the Strawberry Flats Gold Property, local high-grade concentrations of gold are common on Astral's Jumping Josephine project, including one-metre intervals of 50.2 g/t gold and 61.8 g/t gold. In addition, Astral and Kootenay have applied for a 10,000-tonne bulk sampling permit from their Jumping Josephine main zone, where initial flotation tests averaged 98-per-cent gold recovery (see Astral news releases in Stockwatch on Oct. 15, 2009; Oct. 29, 2009; Dec. 16, 2009, Jan. 18, 2010, Feb. 2, 2010 and Aug. 3, 2010; also see the Jumping Josephine technical report dated July 14, 2009 [on SEDAR]).

*The geological information and analytical results reported above predate National Instrument 43-101 and are not National Instrument 43-101 compliant. Dorex and St. Elias have not undertaken any independent investigations of the dimensions, quantity or grade of this gold mineralization, and therefore these historical data should not be relied upon.

Qualified Person

The data contained in this News Release has been reviewed and verified by Paul D. Gray, P.Geo., a “qualified person” for the purposes of National Instrument 43-101 Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects of the Canadian securities administrators.

For additional information on St. Elias and its projects, please visit us at www.steliasmines.com or call
1-888-895-5522 (toll free US and Canada) or contact:

European Investor Relations U.S. Investor Relations

Nicholas Fuller Herbert Haft
Nick Fuller & Associates The Haft Group, Inc.

Tel: 011-44-207-256-5204 Tel: (212) 759-8865

Email: nick@fullerir.com Email: herbhaft@haftgroupinc.com

herbhaft@aol.com

ST. ELIAS MINES LTD.

(signed “Lori McClenahan”)

Lori McClenahan,

President