Trading Symbol:  SLI (TSX Venture Exchange)

EKL (Frankfurt Exchange)

SELSF (U.S. Clearing Symbol)

News Release 2008-09

April 18, 2008

NEWS RELEASE

FINAL DRILL RESULTS FROM WINTER PROGRAM -
CARMI (KETTLE RIVER ) MOLY PROJECT, BC

Lori McClenahan, President of St. Elias Mines Ltd. (“St. Elias” or the “Company”), is pleased to announce the following update received from Hi Ho Silver Resources Inc. (“Hi Ho”) with respect ongoing exploration activity at the Carmi (Kettle River) Molybdenum Property (the “Property”) located in southwestern British Columbia.  Hi Ho has an option to acquire up to a 70% interest in the Property from St. Elias.

Hi Ho has recently received analytical results from the final four holes of the third round of Diamond drilling at the Property.  Results of the last four holes, all drilled at the E Zone are summarized in the table below.

• MoS₂ x 0.5994 = Mo

Diamond drill holes 07-218 and 07-219 are both vertical holes and were drilled on section 7530N with the objective of testing the northern boundary of the mineralization.  Drill hole 07-218 intersected extremely anomalous molybdenite mineralization and shows the mineralized trend probably continues to the northwest.  This will need to be investigated during the upcoming field season.

Drill hole 07-220 was drilled to the southwest at -60º in order to get a better understanding of the geometry of the mineralization.  It intersected the main mineralized body as expected but also intersected a deeper zone of extremely anomalous mineralization.  This will need to be investigated further.

Diamond drill hole 07-221 was collared near the site of hole 07-192 and drilled to the northeast at -50º in order to get a better understanding of the geometry of the mineralized zone.  It intersected the E Zone breccia in the top 43 metres of the hole.

Hi Ho has drilled 32 Diamond core holes on the Property since December 2006 with an objective of confirming and expanding on the known mineralization.  To this end, all work completed to date is being compiled and will be incorporated into a National Instrument 43-101 compliant resource estimate.  It is anticipated that this work should be completed by mid June 2008.  A total of 221 drill holes have been completed on the Property by all parties.  The Property is located eight kilometres from a paved highway and is easily accessible by two wheel drive vehicle.  The project benefits from good infrastructure; high voltage power is nearby and the community of Beaverdell (location of the formerly producing Highland Bell Mine) is less than 30 kilometres away.

All drill core was logged, split and sampled at a secure core facility at Beaverdell.  The work program at Carmi was designed and is supervised by Paul Reynolds , P. Geo. and Michael Sanguinetti, P. Eng. who are independent qualified persons under the definition of National Instrument 43-101.  They are responsible for all aspects of the work including the quality control/quality assurance program.  On-site personnel at the project collect and track samples which are then sealed and shipped to Acme Analytical Laboratories Ltd. in Vancouver and Eco Tech Laboratory Ltd. in Kamloops ..  Both are certified analytical laboratories.  Analytical accuracy and precision are monitored at the laboratory by the analysis of reagent blanks, reference material and replicate samples.  Quality control is further assured by the use of international and in-house standards.  Blind certified reference material and blanks are inserted at regular intervals into the sample sequence by on site personnel in order to independently assess analytical accuracy.  Finally, blind duplicate samples are forwarded to the labs for additional quality control.  The Company will also be conducting summer work programs on all three of their remaining projects when weather permits. Further details of these programs will be released in the coming weeks.

The technical information contained in this news release has been verified by, Paul Reynolds , P. Geo., who is a qualified person as defined in “National Instrument 43-101, Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Properties. ”

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 ).

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 contains forward-looking statements regarding the ongoing and upcoming exploration work and expected geometry of geological formations and structures.  Actual results may differ materially from those currently anticipated in such statements.