Some facts and figures about Noah's ark:
The length and beam of Noah's ark compares with that of a 14000 ton Tanker.
It had the correct proportions, unlike the ark in the Babylonian flood story which was a cube 55 metres by 55 metres by 55 metres!
The ark resembled a huge barge.
It was built just to float - it had no sails, oars, propellors or rudder.
It consisted of 3 decks and a 0.5 metre ventilation gap just below the roof, running it's full length.
The eight images below are shown to the same scale:
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The Mayflower
Length: 19.5 metres
Beam: 8 metres
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Cutty Sark
Length: 67.7 metres
Beam 11 metres
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SMS Scharnhorst
Length: 144.7 metres
Beam: 21.6 metres
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Noah's ark [1]
Length: 140 metres
Beam: 23 metres
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14000 ton Tanker
Length: 135 metres
Beam: 22.5 metres
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Multi Purpose Dry Cargo Ship DWT 22000 ton
Length: 164 metres
Beam: 25.3 metres
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RMS Titanic
Length: 269 metres
Beam: 28 metres
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Supertanker
Length: 300 metres
Beam: 44 metres
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Noah had probably never seen an ocean or had any knowledge of ship building, but the end result was that it had the right proportions to be very sea worthy.
It was also massive in size to hold a lot of cargo, animals and people.
But could Noah have built it?
"Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked with God." [2] and Noah probably was very rich, so he would have been able to hire a lot of men to build it.
We can be utterly amazed how the ancient civilisations built enormous and complex things: The Pyramid's, Stonehenge, cathedrals, complex cranes and other machinery, and all with tremendous accuracy.
When modern engineers come to copy some of the ancient things, their knowledge and skill is often severly stretched and often they express amazement at how it was originally built.
So early mankind were clever engineers.
Also, God gave Noah the dimensions and the plan of how to build it:
"So make yourself an ark of cypress [3] wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. This is how you are to build it....." [4]
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© 2004 seeking-god.co.uk
[1] "The ark is to be 300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide and 30 cubits high." Genesis 6:15
[2] Genesis 6:9
[3] Hebrew word unknown to us.
[4] Genesis 6:14-15