Hong Kong Evangelicals Announce The Finding of Noah’s Ark – Wednesday, April 28, 2010

If proven to be true, the implications are staggering.  According to an article yesterday in the South China Daily Morning Post, a Hong Kong-Turkish team of researchers and videographers announced that they have discovered Noah’s Ark.  The team of 15 said they had excavated and ventured inside seven large wooden compartments on snow-capped Mount Ararat in Turkey last October and they brought back samples from the site, including specimens of wood, white seedling-like particles and remains of rope that they believed was used to keep the animals.

According to team member Yeung Wing-cheung, a 38mm long piece of wood that he held had been carbon dated at 4,888 years old.  This would match the Biblical timeline.   He said that initial findings seem to suggest that the wood is a kind of cypress rather than the gopher wood that the Bible says the Ark was built from.  There will be further tests to see if the two woods matched and laboratory tests will be carried out on other specimens.

What is unique is that this is the first team endorsed by the Turkish government.  It is a joint effort between Hong Kong based Media Evangelism, Noah’s Ark Ministry International and the government of Turkey.  One of the project participants, Dutch researcher Gerrit Aalten said “There is a tremendous amount of solid evidence that the structure found on Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey is the legendary ark of Noah."

Yeung said that the team doesn’t claim that they have found the actual ark since no one has ever seen it.  However he went on to say “But the environmental evidence we found this time match with historical accounts.”  He would later tell Agence-France Press “It's not 100 per cent that it is Noah's Ark, but we think it is 99.9 per cent that this is it.”

Other scholars who were a part of the team concurred.  Professor Oktay Belli, an archaeologist at the University of Istanbul, ruled out the possibility of human settlement because it has never been found above 3,500 metres. Dr Ahmet Ozbek, geologist at Kahramanmaras Sutcu Iman University in Turkey, said the low temperature and environmental condition of glacier deposits and volcanic material helped preservation at the site.

The group did not announce the exact location of the find.  They are waiting for the Turkish government to set up a preservation area for the archaeological work and have asked that Turkish officials apply to UNESCO so that the site can be granted World Heritage Site status while it is explored.

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