This announcement from the ARRL Awards Committee will be shared with the DXAC tonight or tomorrow, prior to public release. The brevity of the announcement belies the amount of research, thought and discussion behind it. Bernie McClenny's explanation in "How's DX?" on page 86 of October QST is good, except that there is a possibility that - depending on how they are treated on the US Department of State's list of "Dependencies and Areas of Special Sovereignty" - Saba and Sint Eustatius may end up as separate DXCC entities. Thus there will be two deletions from, and either four or five additions to, the DXCC list, effective at 0400Z on October 10. While the announcement should clarify the situation to the satisfaction of the vast majority of DXCC participants, a few DXCC rules aficionados may want to know why the "Event Date" is not the date upon which the State Department's list reflects the changes being made. The answer is that this would create an administrative nightmare with regard to contacts made with these locations - and there will be many - between the universally agreed time of the dissolution of the political entity upon which the current two DXCC entities are based, and whenever the State Department gets around to updating its list. Dave K1ZZ To clarify the administrative process by which the anticipated changes to the two existing Netherlands Antilles DXCC entities will be made, the ARRL Awards Committee has determined that at 0400Z (12:00 AM local time in the islands) on 10 October 2010, the two Netherland Antilles DXCC entities will be deleted. Commencing at 0400Z (12:00 AM local time) on 10 October, 2010, operation from the islands of Curacao, Bonaire, Sint Maarten, Saba, and St Eustatius will count for a yet-to-be-determined number of new entities under the DXCC List Criteria, and Political Entities, Rule 1 and/or Rule 2 Geographic Separation Entities. When the Awards Committee determines what Rule 1 or Rule 2 actions apply, it will announce the final disposition of the entities on the DXCC list. The DXCC desk will not accept confirmations for these new entities until after 1 January, 2011.