The year-end donations also allow for our architects and engineers to continue to work on the necessary site and building plans for the Ark and other facilities.

Last week, we signed the formal contract with the Troyer Group. We hope to have all of our construction permits in hand by November of this year (2013).

Martin Miranda (Troyer Group CFO), LeRoy Troyer (Troyer Group president and chair), and Mike Zovath (Ark Encounter senior vice-president and co-founder) are pictured above signing the contract. The Troyer Group, located in Mishawaka, Indiana, is bringing its construction management skills to this project.

With the contract signed and permit process underway, activity will increase on the Ark Encounter site in anticipation of—and in preparation—for the long-awaited construction phase. Continue checking the Ark Encounter website for updates to see what is taking place and what is to come. Once bidding opportunities are available, we will be posting that information on the site as well.

We appreciate all of your prayers and support as we move closer to bringing the Ark Encounter project to Williamstown, Kentucky!

First, for the $24.5 million that Answer is Genesis is raising towards the Ark Encounter project, we are thrilled to announce that the Ark funding “thermometer” recently passed the $10 million mark! The Ark funding “thermometer” reflects Ark donations and boarding pass purchases that have been made to date towards the construction of a full-size Ark. Both donations and boarding pass purchases have been increasing over the past several months as more people catch the vision for the evangelistic Ark Encounter.

Second, a few supporters of AiG have been moved by the Lord to bless the Ark project with $1.25 million in matching gift contributions and commitments before the end of the year!

That means that every donation for the Ark Encounter project we receive before the end of the year will be matched dollar-for-dollar up to $1.25 million! Praise God!

Would you prayerfully consider a special donation for the Ark Encounter by the end of the year? Your tax-deductible donation will effectively be “doubled” by these matching gifts. They will also help us get critical permits and design plans completed!

Your gift today will be a tremendous blessing in making a major step forward in the preparations to build the full-scale Ark. The Ark Encounter will reach millions of people in our nation, and the world, with the truth of God’s Word—and the gospel message most of all!

General donations for the Ark Encounter as well as sponsorship donations for a peg, plank, or beam are included in the matching gift program, but charter lifetime boarding pass purchases are not.

Artist's depiction of a future exhibit at the Ark Encounter where visitors will be given a glimpse of what the world may have looked like right before the Flood.

“It was very good” refers to everything God had created, including man. Man was not created susceptible to diseases like cancer. He had no inclination toward developing cataracts in his eyes or cavities in his teeth. His DNA contained no mutations, and his brain functioned flawlessly. It is said that we use only a fraction of our mental capabilities. That is apparently true, but one thing is certain: when God finished assembling Adam’s brain, it fired on all cylinders and ran smoothly! Compared to us, he was an intellectual giant!

So, what happened? Sin happened, and the world God called “very good” began to break down. Genesis 2:17 records that the penalty for Adam’s disobedience included the entrance of death and corruption into the world.

Today we see the results of that collapse in diseases like cancer, cataracts, and cavities. The list seems endless. When God commissioned Noah to build the Ark, however, these defects hadn’t had as much time to manifest themselves in humans. Ancient men were not brutish knuckle-draggers as evolutionists claim, but brilliant, creative beings capable of building a civilization that might astound us today.

Regretfully, brilliant men are capable of brilliant sinning. Because of this behavior, God destroyed Noah’s marvelous-looking world in a global Flood, burying it forever.

For a glimpse of how that incredible world may have looked, plan a visit to Ark Encounter when it opens in northern Kentucky!

Help us build a full-scale Noah’s Ark! AiG‘s part in the Ark Encounter project is raising $24.5 million in donations for an all-wood Ark, the centerpiece and first phase of the whole multi-attraction complex! A finished Ark will be a great testimony to the historicity of the Bible and will proclaim the gospel. For an explanation of the funding of the entire Ark Encounter, go to ArkEncounter.com.

One thing we don’t have to guess at is the need for some type of internal lighting. Noah was told “a window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above” (Genesis 6:16). Was this window for light, ventilation, or both?

Here’s the challenge. The Ark had three decks, so how could a window on the roof illuminate the two decks below? Let’s put on our Sherlock Homlesian deerstalker caps, because buried within the verse above is a clue.

Concerning the Ark, Genesis mentions windows only twice. The second reference is in Genesis 8:6. “Noah opened the window of the Ark which he made.” Here’s where it gets interesting. In this verse, the Holy Spirit inspired the use of the word challon, “a window.”* In the first reference, however, He used tsohar, “a light.”** Tsohar comes from the Hebrew root tsahar, “to glisten.”

Did God perhaps instruct Noah to build “a light that glistened”?

Of the 24 times tsohar is used in the Old Testament, it is translated “window” only once. The 23 other occurrences refer to “noon” or “the noonday sun.”

How did Noah illuminate the Ark? We won’t know that, unless the might ship could still be found. (It’s highly doubtful that even sections of the Ark will ever be found on volcanic Mt. Ararat, or where the Bible says the Ark landed—in the “mountains of Ararat.”)

An ancient Hebrew tradition says the tsohar was a very large pearl or gem that Noah hung in the rafters of the Ark, which powered itself and illuminated the Ark.*** That’s highly speculative to consider, of course, but it is something we have come across in our research.

*Strongs Concordance H2474

**Strongs H6672

***Rene Noorbergen, Secrets of the Lost Races (TEACH Services, Inc.). p 46.

Help us build a full-scale Noah’s Ark! AiG’s part in the Ark Encounter project is raising $24.5 million in donations for an all-wood Ark, the centerpiece and first phase of the whole multi-attraction complex! A finished Ark will be a great testimony to the historicity of the Bible. Visit ArkEncounter.com for more information!

But what about the plants he needed? Since we do not have many specifics about the Ark’s non-animal contents, let’s engage in some (reasonable) speculation.

Now, we do know that before the Flood, humans were told by God to be vegetarian, so Noah would likely have preserved as many plants as he could, even some as dried foods. How else would his primary food sources have survived a year-long immersion beneath the hot ocean formed by the “fountains of the deep” bursting forth (Genesis 7:11)?

Long before the Flood began, Noah may have begun preserving seeds and cultivating plants so that there would be fresh food to eat during the one year voyage. Noah may have potted seedlings to preserve the useful trees and shrubs too. The Ark’s upper deck beneath the long window may have been specially designed to accommodate these plants, turning part of the Ark into a vast greenhouse.

Most plants could have survived outside the Ark upon floating rafts of vegetation as seeds and as debris that could have been propagated as cuttings in the bud left behind by the retreating waters. But when you look at the variety of vegetation in the world today, you can’t help but think Noah’s “floating arboretum” (as one might call it) could have been successful.

Amazingly, much of God’s wondrous creation did survive the Flood … but sadly, much was lost. God’s original Creation was perfect, including the food eaten from the Tree of Life in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:22), which was to have sustained man forever. But Adam’s sin corrupted God’s perfect plan, and eventually after the Flood man’s long lifespan dropped dramatically.

It’s significant that when Noah left the Ark, God gave him permission to eat animal flesh (Genesis 9:3). Might it be that some essential plant foods did not survive the global deluge and Noah needed additional food sources? Or if they did, had the world changed so dramatically that those wonderful life-sustaining plants could no longer survive?

Things to ponder.

Help us build a full-scale Noah’s Ark! AiG’s part in the Ark Encounter project is raising $24.5 million in donations for an all-wood Ark, the centerpiece and first phase of the whole multi-attraction complex! A finished Ark will be a great testimony to the historicity of the Bible and will proclaim the gospel. For an explanation of the funding of the entire Ark Encounter, go to ArkEncounter.com.

The set filled a large section of the Creation Museum’s fabrication shop:

Here is Noah, dressed and ready for action:

This won’t be on the video, but here is Noah as he catches up on emails between takes.

A few solutions come to mind. Noah could have dumped it overboard. Or he might have composted it to enrich the plants he probably brought with them. Or Noah might have just let it pile up in the bottom deck (though adding a certain “ambiance” to their year-long voyage).

One low-tech solution rarely mentioned is the “methane digester.” All Noah would have needed was a simple airtight container to hold the manure, the proper bacteria, and a way of piping the resulting bio-gas to places where it could perform useful work—like a heating, cooking, and lighting inside the ship.

The gas pipes might have been as basic as hollow reeds sealed with natural latex from the rubber tree, Hevea brasiliensses. Methane at ambient temperature and pressure is lighter than air and would flow naturally from the lowest point of Noah’s ship (where the digesters would be located), to the decks above, providing reliable gaslight illumination in what must have been an otherwise dark environment.

The Ark was being designed about 4,450 years ago, when mankind was still highly intelligent (Noah’s ancestor, Adam, possessed a nearly perfect brain as God created him), and Noah could easily have mastered this simple technology.

A methane digester was a practical solution for a stinky problem, which probably endeared Noah’s kin—or at least their noses—to his resourcefulness.

Help us build a full-scale Noah’s Ark! AiG’s part in the Ark Encounter project is raising $24.5 million in donations for an all-wood Ark, the centerpiece and first phase of the whole multi-attraction complex! A finished Ark will be a great testimony to the historicity of the Bible and will proclaim the gospel. For an explanation of the funding of the entire Ark Encounter, go to ArkEncounter.com.

The Bible says nothing more about Tubal-cain, and although further information would have been helpful, this revelation alone helps us solve one giant, gnawing problem.

Castoroides ohioensis! This huge species of giant beaver was eight feet long, and by some estimates weighed upward of 450 pounds. It’s not hard to imagine a chisel-tooth chainsaw of this size making short work of any wooden cage Noah might have built for it!

Buy, you say, Castoroides ohioensis was only one of many beavers that made up the beaver “kind.” Perhaps Noah could have taken a normal-size beaver on the Ark instead.

What about the other gnawing creatures, like squirrels, rats, porcupines, hamsters, gerbils, chinchillas, guinea pigs, and rabbits? We can imagine Shem and Mrs. Shem darting about the Ark with oversized butterfly nets trying to get the little critters back into their cages … except the Bible tells us Tubal-cain had already learned to fashion things out of iron and brass. Animal cages, for instance.

One gnawing problem solved! Learn to think outside the “evolutionary cage,” A visit to the future Ark Encounter in northern Kentucky will show you how Noah might have managed all those animals on his mighty ship.

Help us build a full-scale Noah’s Ark! AiG’s part in the Ark Encounter project is raising $24.5 million in donations for an all-wood Ark, the centerpiece and first phase of the whole multi-attraction complex! A finished Ark will be a great testimony to the historicity of the Bible. Visit ArkEncounter.com for more information!

This fire breathing dragon began appearing on billboards around the USA to promote the Creation Museum in northern Kentucky. The museum features a theater that presents dragon legends from around the world.

The fact that man and dragons lived together is hard to deny. You can also read articles on our website (AnswersInGenesis.org) presenting additional evidence that dragons were contemporaneous with humans.

The Bible tells us God created the land-dwelling animals on Day Six of Creation—aardvarks to zebras … and dragons/dinosaurs. We’re also told that when God brought Noah’s Flood upon the earth, all air-breathing land creatures except those inside Noah’s Ark died. Therefore, the dragons recorded down through history must have been descendants of dragons aboard Noah’s Ark.

But aren’t dragons huge? How could they fit inside the Ark?

Contrary to popular opinion, the average size was only about that of a sheep. It’s the huge ones, however, that we usually think of. But Noah didn’t have to take huge, full-grown adults. A hatching male and female Allosaurus would have fit handily in his two coat pockets.

To see just how large the Ark was, what it might have been like to live and work and play inside it, and what kinds of animals might have been aboard it, plan a visit to the Ark Encounter when it opens in northern Kentucky in a few years. Only when you enter our full-size replica of Noah’s Ark, beware. Hic sunt dracones—here there be dragons!

Help us build a full-scale Noah’s Ark! AiG’s part in the Ark Encounter project is raising $24.5 million in donations for an all-wood Ark, the centerpiece and first phase of the whole multi-attraction complex! A finished Ark will be a great testimony to the historicity of the Bible. Visit ArkEncounter.com for more information.

Here is a photo of the set as it is being constructed.

And here are two photos of the actor playing Noah getting prepped for the video.

Ben Wilt, who is heading up the video shoot, wrote to me saying, “Thought you might be interested in seeing our hair and make-up test. This was a test that Doug Henderson did on our actor who will be playing Noah in the upcoming video I’m shooting for the Ark team. The test went great, and I think our Noah character is looking very cool! I’m very excited about this video as I think it’ll really help in the fundraising effort.”

For updates on the building of a full-size Noah’s Ark south of Cincinnati, Ohio, and to watch our current Ark Encounter video, go to ArkEncounter.com.