It has been widely reported that the location of Noah's Ark was discovered in Turkey, near the Iranian border, but Christian author and apologist Ken Ham remains skeptical.
Last week, an article in the U.S. Sun newspaper stirred controversy over the location by describing how experts utilized 3D scans to examine a structure on Turkey's Mount Tendürek that resembles Noah's Ark in shape.
In 1959, researchers proposed that the location might resemble Noah's Ark. However, the 3D scans are reportedly new.
Scientists from Noah's Ark Scans performed the study. According to their findings, further evidence points to the formation being a "man-made structure" that fits the Biblical description of Noah's Ark. During their news briefing, the scans "showed parallel lines and angular shapes" beneath the surface that "appeared to resemble rooms, possibly underneath a deck-like platform."
"This is not what you would expect to see if this site is just a solid block of rock or an accumulation of random debris from a mudflow," said researcher Andrew Jones to the newspaper.
But Ken Ham, the founder and head of the organization Answers in Genesis (AIG), isn't sold on the finding.
"This isn't a new find. ... It was first postulated as an Ark site back in 1959 and has been disputed (and refuted) ever since, including by Christians and creationists who believe God's Word and would certainly love to find the ark (although we don't have to)," Ham said on his blog. "... [H]as Noah's Ark been found? We would say no."
In his argument, Ham referenced a research by AIG geologist Andrew Snelling, who doubts whether the boat itself survived since Noah and his family would have dismantled it for wood. Snelling reasoned that when Noah and his family stepped off the Ark, there would have been "no mature trees available for Noah and his family to build shelters after they got off the Ark."
Furthermore, according to Snelling, the location in Turkey is "in a valley and not on a mountain as described by the Genesis account."
"It is unclear exactly the identity and location of the 'mountains of Ararat' [Genesis 8:4; notice the plural word 'mountains'], but even this site sits on volcanic lava flows (under the mud flows), which like Mount Ararat itself is a post-Flood volcano that even recently erupted," Snelling explained. "The Ark landed on a mountain on Day 150 of the Flood, so if it landed on a volcano that was still erupting and erupted again later during the Flood, the survival of Noah and his cargo would be at risk."
The Ark does not have to be discovered in order for it to be accepted as a historical fact, Snelling pointed out, adding that Christians "have the infallible testimony of the ever-present, all-knowing Creator in His Word. And even if the Ark were found, scoffers would still reject the evidence, dismissing it as a replica built by worshippers to a myth they believed in."
Dr. Snelling's whole body of work may be seen on AIG website here.
