St. Elias Mines Ltd. Acquires Strategic Claims Adjoining Tesoro Gold Project, Peru

10/13/2010 [ACCESSWIRE]

Vancouver, B.C. October 12, 2010 Lori McClenahan, President of St. Elias Mines Ltd. (SLI – TSX:V) (“St. Elias” or the ``Company``), is pleased to announce that the Company has acquired six strategic mineral claims (the "New Tesoro Claims") surrounding its existing Tesoro Gold Project (the "Property") located in southwestern Peru.

New Tesoro Claims

Exploration results to date have shown the Tesoro Gold Project to be permissive for the expansion of known gold mineralized zones both on strike and to depth as well as the discovery of additional gold mineralization. In that regard, the Company has staked six New Tesoro Claims (Chance A, B, C, D, E and F) surrounding its existing Tesoro Gold Project. Prior to the acquisition of the New Claims, the Tesoro Project comprised three mineral claims (Chance 1, Chance 2 and Chance 5) covering approximately 5,000 acres. With the addition of the New Tesoro Claims, the Tesoro Gold Project covers 17,436 acres.

``We are very pleased with the acquisition of these additional claims. It is a natural evolution of the Project to acquire these strategic claims considering the exploration results received to date`` stated Lori McClenahan, President of the Company.

Tesoro Gold Project, Peru

The Tesoro Gold Project, consisting of nine mineral claims covering 17,436 acres, is located in the Department of Arequipa in the District of Acari in southwestern Peru. The Property is 100% owned by the Company with no underlying royalties.

The Property lies within the well-known 300 km X 30 km Nazca-Ocoña gold belt adjacent to and paralleling the Pacific coast of southwestern Peru. The Nazca-Ocoña gold belt has a long mining history dating back to pre-Incan time with more than 70 gold (± copper) deposits have been discovered and exploited since the 17th century, most of which are quartz-vein hosted gold deposits.

The Tesoro Property can be defined as an advanced stage gold exploration target that hosts several historic gold showings and gold workings. The style of mineralization represents a mesothermal vein exploration target. To date, mesothermal-vein style gold mineralization has been identified superficially and to depths of over 100 metres.

The Tesoro Property has never been evaluated to depth, or to its full strike potential. This leaves a large potential for the discovery of additional mineralization.

Chief Financial Officer

The Company has appointed Kulwant Sandher as its Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Sandher is a Chartered Accountant whose first degree was a B.Sc (Eng) in Avionics. He has 19 years of experience in finance management roles in companies such as Wang Europe and Wang U.K. Limited, Rennie & Company Chartered Accountants, Maximizer Technologies. He has served as CFO for The Stallion Group, Serebra Learning Corp, Conac Software Corp, and served as a COO for Marketrend Interactive Inc. Currently, Kulwant is serving as a Director and Chief Financial Officer of Delta Oil & Gas Inc. and Chief Financial Officer of Millrock Resources Inc.

Incentive Stock Options

The Company has granted incentive stock options to certain of the Company’s directors, officers, employees and consultants to purchase up to 1,000,000 common shares under the Company’s Stock Option Plan. The options will be granted for a period of two years, commencing on
October 12, 2010 at a price of $1.56 per share.

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

The TSX Venture Exchange has not reviewed and does not accept responsibility for the adequacy or the accuracy of the contents of this document.

This News Release may contain forward-looking statements including, but not limited to, comments regarding the timing and content of upcoming work programs, geological interpretations, potential mineral recovery processes, etc. Forward-looking statements address future events and conditions and therefore involve inherent risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statement.