Hello, All.

With the religious discussion of late in here, I thought this might be interesting:

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Virginia Man to Search for Noah's Ark in Turkey

Monday , February 02, 2009

AP

LYNCHBURG, Va.

It's one of the most familiar Bible stories.

Saddened by the wickedness of man, God directs the righteous Noah to build
an ark for his family and two of each species of animal.

Together, they ride the ark through 40 days and 40 nights of torrential
rains that God unleashes upon the Earth. And when the waters subside, Noah
and the animals return to land.

"That seems almost like a fairy story," said archaeologist
Randall Price, who is director of Liberty University's new Center for
Judaic Studies. "But we believe it was an actual event."

This summer Price, 57, plans to continue on a journey to prove just that as
he joins an expedition to Mount Ararat. His team believes that it is there,
in Eastern Turkey, where Noah's Ark remains preserved underneath layers of
rubble and ice.

"There's a whole trail of history pointing to it [Mt. Ararat],"
Price said in a recent interview. "But in our age, people tend to
think it is more of a story like Jack and the Bean Stalk.' Our aim is to
show that the Bible is good history."

He pointed to Genesis 8:4, which states, "and on the seventeenth day
of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat,"
in The New International Version of the Bible.

For centuries, expeditions have set out to find Noah's Ark but have been
unable to find any concrete evidence, beyond that of an unwavering faith,
to support its existence.

Retired Continental Airlines Pilot Richard Bright, 64, has visited Turkey
more than 30 times over the past 25 years in search of the vessel.

"We've received many leads over the years, dating back into
antiquity," he said. "We've had so many reports over the years,
and they talk about the same mountain."

Last fall, a new tip peaked both his and Price's interest.

A Kurdish shepherd told them that he had seen the ark, and even climbed on
top of it, when he was a boy.

The team hypothesizes that the ark is preserved in several pieces beneath a
glacier on the mountain, and every so often the glacier recedes, exposing
part of the vessel.

"That's when he saw it as a boy," Price said, adding that they
had interviewed the shepherd and could find no reason to distrust him.

The shepherd asked for nothing in return, and agreed to lead Bright to the
site where he said he had seen the ark.

Bright first climbed to the site in September. Then a team including Price,
the shepherd, a mountaineer and several others made a follow-up ascent to
15,000 feet later the same month.

They found the spot, Price said, but it now is covered by an estimated
60-foot-deep pile of boulders. Price believes the landslide may have
resulted from attacks against Kurdish rebels on the mountain, or perhaps
from explosives that were set off to cover up the ark.

"It's a very delicate and almost clandestine environment," he
said of the area, which is near the Turkish border to Iran and Armenia.
"The danger level is high."

But his team has negotiated with government and military authorities and
gained access to work at the site starting this spring, Price said.

That's when the team of archaeologists, geologists, explorers and other
volunteers plan to start removing boulders.

By summertime, they hope to reach the glacier and use ice-melting equipment
to access what they believe is preserved beneath. If a structure is found,
they plan to take samples to have analyzed and dated.

But that may not be proof enough for some. Bright said people would have to
make up their own minds.

"We intend to, God willing, find enough of it to at least show that we
have an ancient structure," he said. "If we find a great big
structure up there that fits the dimensions, and if there are compartments
in there, and it's ancient What else could it be, way up there, thousands
of feet in the air?"

Work also must be done leading up to the expedition.

Price estimated that the team needs to raise about $60,000 to pay for
permission to use the site, to buy the necessary machinery and to fund
about two months of work on location.

Bright said a discovery would "mean so much to so many, many people
worldwide."

"Keep your ear to the road, so to speak, this summer," he said.
"Because there will be discovery. The only thing that's holding us
back is to finance the machinery that we need."
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Later,
Sean

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