AU2V, Sacrifice Rock: New IOTA DXpedition coming up near my region!

Few days back VU3WEW had mentioned about a planned IOTA DXpedition to Sacrifice Rock which is along the coast of my own district. In fact I had a glimpse of the Sacrifice Rock called Velliyamkallu in local language, literally meaning silvery white stone. That was when I climbed to the top of Thikkodi lighthouse a few years back. Lighthouse keeper showed me Velliyamkallu in the sea to the North West of the lighthouse. According to our state tourism department webpage, the island has sharp rocks, deep caverns and is an awe-inspiring yet challenging landscape for adventure lovers. It is just a two-acre island, about 14 km from Payyoli in Kozhikode district, Kerala, needing an adventurous one hour boat journey from Payyoli beach. VU3WEW had mentioned that amateur radio equipment will have to enclosed in sealed barrels and towed to the rock as there is no point for landing a boat at the rock.

Today VU2RS, who is the team leader of the DXpedition, posted a link on X regarding a write up on AU2V, Sacrifice Rock / AS-161 by EA1CS – DX INFO. AS stands for Asia in the IOTA, Islands on the Air, coding of entities. The page is in Spanish language and Google Translate was used to read the contents. They are planning even 80m and 160m for the DXpedition. VU3TPW told me that VU3WEW has been conduction experiments on 80m and 160m antennas locally. It has been mentioned that various equipment like bandpass filters, amplifiers, power cables, generators and other critical articles have already been shipped to this region. Other participants are VU2TT, VU3DXA, VU3TPW (from my district again) and VU3GDS. Regular antennas planned are 40-6m beam, 6-10m beam, and verticals.