Dutch Contractor Creates Noah’s Ark Replica

Dutch millionaire contractor and avid creationist Johan Huibers has built a working replica of Noah’s Ark and opened its doors to tourists in the Netherlands.

When creating the boat Huibers wanted it to be as close as possible to the original description of the boat in the Bible, though he did have to make certain adjustments. Instead of using “gopher wood” for the Ark like Noah did, Huibers used Swedish pine, but he thinks that God won’t mind because he instructed Noah to use a “resin wood” so he’s on the same path.

He also built the Ark around a steel frame unlike Noah’s fully wooden version, but again he doesn’t think God will be too bothered about the fact that he’s added the odd security feature, considering he is trying to save all his creatures.

The Book of Genesis describes the Ark as being 300 cubits in length and 50 cubits in width, with a height of 30 cubits. A cubit is the distance of a man’s arm from elbow to fingertip. Huibers used his own arm and his replica came to approximately 450 feet in length…I’ll leave you to work out the math for the other dimensions!

Because of space restrictions and animal rights, Huibers boat, which has been dubbed Johan’s Ark, won’t house two of all of the world’s animals like the Biblical version did. As seen in the video, Jonah’s Ark is currently home to a few animals of the farmyard variety: chickens, a lamb and a pony can be seen getting accustomed to their new surroundings! It will also host a number of plastic critters for tourists to ogle – presumably of the more exotic animals that are harder to keep safely on a boat!

Huibers originally intended to sail the boat to London to coincide with the Olympics and show off his creation to the many tourists in the city, however the security measures he needed to fulfill took too long and that idea was abandoned.

This is Huibers second Ark, in 2004 he built a smaller scale Ark, reported to be half the size of this one and sailed it around the country’s canals. He used the revenue gained from the tourists that it attracted to finance his current ark!

He was compelled to build the Ark after having a dream 30 years ago that his native Netherlands was submerged in water after suffering a terrible flood like that which was described in the Old Testament.

Sooooo weird…I dreamt London was flooding just last night. Don’t think God wants me to build a boat though, he doesn’t usually entrust those sorts of things to agnostics!