Where Was Noah's Ark's Door Located?

Where Was Noah's Ark's Door Located?

Bodie Hodge, M.Sc., B.Sc., PEI

Biblical Authority Ministries, June 8, 2026 (Donate)

One of the most intriguing questions about Noah's Ark concerns the location of its door. While Genesis does not provide a detailed blueprint, it does offer enough information to make reasonable conclusions. Genesis 6:16 states:

"You shall make a window for the ark, and you shall finish it to a cubit from above; and set the door of the ark in its side. You shall make it with lower, second, and third decks" (NKJV).

This verse reveals that the Ark had three decks and that the door was placed in its side. Although the exact location is not specified, the text and basic principles of ship design provide clues.

The Door Was Likely On The Second Deck

The mention of "lower, second, and third decks" immediately follows the instruction concerning the door. Many have suggested that the door was likely positioned at the level of the second deck rather than on the lowest deck. Due to the term “lower” being used, it effectively places the door above that deck.

Image requested by Bodie Hodge*

This placement would have practical advantages. The Ark's dimensions were 300 cubits[1] long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high (Genesis 6:15). A vessel of this size floating in water would have a substantial draft, meaning part of the hull would remain below the waterline. If the door were located on the lowest deck, it could have been dangerously close to the water level, especially during the violent conditions of the Flood. A second-deck entrance would remain safely above the waterline (called the “draft level”) while still allowing convenient access.

Such a location would also permit ramps to be used for bringing animals, supplies, food, and equipment aboard before the Flood began. Once loading was complete, the ramp could be removed and stored inside.

Structural Considerations

From an engineering perspective, the exact placement along the length of the Ark is also worth considering. Large vessels experience significant stresses and strains while floating. Waves can cause bending forces known as hogging and sagging. These stresses tend to be greatest near the center of a ship.

Door Forward Design; Image requested by Bodie Hodge*

For this reason, it may have been unwise to place a large opening directly in the middle of the Ark's side. A door weakens a structure because it interrupts the continuity of the hull. Therefore, it is reasonable to suggest that the entrance was located somewhat forward or aft of the center, while still avoiding the extreme ends of the vessel where other stresses and operational difficulties could occur.

Door Aft Design; Image requested by Bodie Hodge*

Although Scripture does not specify the exact position, a second-deck door located moderately toward the front or rear would make good engineering sense and preserve the Ark's structural integrity. As an engineer, this makes good sense when the door is analyzed in this position.

Loading Animals And Supplies

The location of the door would have greatly assisted Noah and his family in loading the Ark. Land dwelling, air-breathing animals of every kind had to enter, along with vast quantities of food and provisions for the duration of the Flood.

A second-deck entrance would provide direct access to central storage and distribution areas. From there, animals and supplies could be moved up or down to the appropriate deck using internal ramps, stairways, dumbwaiters, or sloped passageways. This arrangement would make the loading process more efficient and reduce congestion.

The Lord Shut The Door

Genesis 6:14 records that Noah was instructed to cover the Ark inside and outside with pitch. This waterproofing would have helped preserve the vessel and prevent leaks.

A natural question arises: if Noah entered through the door, how could he seal it from the outside after everyone was aboard?

Scripture provides the answer. Genesis 7:16 says:

"And the LORD shut him in" (NKJV).

The final sealing of the Ark was not Noah's responsibility. God Himself closed and secured the door. Whatever method was used, it was perfect and complete. The Lord ensured that the Ark remained watertight and that those inside were safely protected throughout the Flood.

This action also carried theological significance. Just as God shut the door of the Ark, He alone controls the door of salvation. Christ, who is God, is the door by which we must enter to be saved for all eternity. The Ark door was a “type” by which, Noah and his family had to enter to be saved.

The door of the Ark did not remain open, just as the time to be saved will not always be open. When judgment comes, that door is closed. Once the Flood began, the opportunity for repentance had ended, and only those inside the Ark were preserved. When your last breath is taken, then judgment will come for all eternity. Have you received Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior?

Noah's Exit Strategy

Noah likely made preparations not only for entering the Ark but also for leaving it. Since the entrance was elevated above the ground, some means of access would have been required after the Ark came to rest.

An external ramp used during loading could have been brought inside before the Flood began. After the waters receded and God commanded Noah to leave the Ark (Genesis 8:15-19), this ramp could have been repositioned to provide safe passage to the ground.

An exit ramp would have surely been prepared, likely a bit more complex, but this give you an idea. Image requested by Bodie Hodge*

Such planning would fit Noah's careful obedience and attention to detail throughout the Ark's construction.

Conclusion

While the Bible does not reveal the precise location of Noah's Ark's door, we can ascertain from Genesis 6:16 that it was likely situated in the side of the Ark and likely near the level of the second deck—whether forward or aft. Such a position would keep the entrance safely above the waterline (draft level) It would also be an ideal position for the loading of animals and supplies, and avoid unnecessary structural weakness in the hull.

The Ark's door also reminds us of a greater spiritual truth. Noah could not save himself by merely building the Ark; Christ Himself shut the door and preserved those within. The Ark became a God-appointed refuge from judgment, foreshadowing the salvation that God provides for His people through His gracious provision. As there was one door into the Ark, so there is one Savior through whom sinners are rescued from judgment and brought safely into God's care.

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Bodie Hodge, Ken Ham's son in law, has been an apologist defending 6-day creation and opposing evolution since 1998. He spent 21 years working at Answers in Genesis as a speaker, writer, and researcher as well as a founding news anchor for Answers News. He was also head of the Oversight Council.  

Bodie launched Biblical Authority Ministries in 2015 as a personal website and it was organized officially in 2025 as a 501(c)(3). He has spoken on multiple continents and hosts of US states in churches, colleges, and universities. He is married with four children.

Mr. Hodge earned a Bachelor and Master of Science degrees from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale (SIUC). Then he taught at SIUC for a couple of years as a Visiting Instructor teaching all levels of undergraduate engineering and running a materials lab and a CAD lab. He did research on advanced ceramic materials to develop a new method of production of titanium diboride with a grant from Lockheed Martin. He worked as a Test Engineer for Caterpillar, Inc., prior to entering full-time ministry.

His love of science was coupled with a love of history, philosophy, and theology. For about one year of his life, Bodie was editing and updating a theological, historical, and scientific dictionary/encyclopedia for AI use and training. Mr. Hodge has over 25 years of experience in writing, speaking and researching in these fields. 

*Images generated by ChatGPT

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[1] A Cubit was from the fingertips to the elbow and a long cubit would add a handbreadth to the cubit. They typically ranged from about 18 inches to 21 inches in ancient cultures; there were exceptions of course.

Did Noah Need Oxygen Tanks On The Ark?

Did Noah Need Oxygen Tanks On The Ark? 

Bodie Hodge, M.Sc., B.Sc., PEI

Biblical Authority Ministries, June 26, 2025 (Donate) 

Why would someone ask this question? Let’s back up and look at this from a big picture. Consider what the Bible says about the voyage of the Ark (all NASB unless otherwise denoted): 

The water prevailed more and more upon the earth, so that all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered. The water prevailed fifteen cubits higher, and the mountains were covered. (Genesis 7:19–20).[1] 

People then look at the earth today and note that the highest mountain is Mt. Everest, which stands just over 29,000 feet above sea level. Then they put two and two together and say that Noah’s Ark floated at least 15 cubits above Mt. Everest—and at such high altitude, people need oxygen![2] 

It sounds like a straightforward argument, doesn’t it? But did you notice that I emphasized the word today? In light of this, the solution is quite simple: the Flood did not happen on today’s earth, but rather on the earth of nearly 4,300 years ago. 

The world today is not the same as it was before the Flood, or even during the Flood. For instance, if the mountains, continents, and oceans basins of today’s earth were more leveled out (as would be expected in a global Flood), the planet’s surface water alone would cover the earth an estimated 1.66 miles deep—about 8,000 feet. Yet when I visited Cusco, Peru, which is around 11,000 feet above sea level, I didn’t need an oxygen tank. 

Andes Mountains above Cusco—well over 2 miles high—with sea fossils (closed shells, ammonites, etc.) from the Flood; Pictures by Bodie Hodge

Furthermore, atmospheric air pressure is relative to sea level. So, as rising sea levels pushed the air column higher, the air pressure at sea level would stay the same.

Psalm 104:6–9: Creation Or The Flood? 

By day 150 of the Flood, mountains began overtaking the water again as the mountain-building phase had begun (Genesis 8:2–4). Poetic Psalm 104 gives further hints of this mountain building as the valley basins sank down: 

You covered it with the deep as with a garment; The waters were standing above the mountains. At Your rebuke they fled, At the sound of Your thunder they hurried away. The mountains rose; the valleys sank down To the place which You established for them. You set a boundary that they may not pass over, So that they will not return to cover the earth. (Psalm 104:6–9) 

This section of the psalm is obviously speaking of the Flood, as water would no longer return to cover the earth—if this passage were speaking of Creation Week (as some commentators have stated), then God would have erred when the waters covered the whole earth during the Flood. 

Consider this overview of the entire Psalm continues down through history:

Psalm 104:1–5	Creation Week
Psalm 104:6–9	Flood
Psalm 104:10–35	Post-Flood

It makes sense that, because the Psalm is referring to the earth and what is in it, it begins with earth history (Creation Week). But mentions of donkeys (verse 11) and goats (verse 18) show variation within the created kind, which shows this would have taken place after the Flood. Also, a post-Flood geographic location is named (Lebanon, verse 16) as well as ships (verse 26) that indicate this psalm was not entirely a look at Creation Week.

Lost In Translation? 

While everyone agrees that Psalm 104:1–5 is referring to Creation Week, what of the argument—made by many commentators from the 1600s onward—that attributes Psalm 104:6–9 to Creation Week? One could suggest that much of this is due to the translation being viewed. Two basic variants of the translation of the Hebrew in Psalm 104:8 read: 

1. “They went up over the mountains and went down into the valleys.”
2. “Mountains rose and the valleys sank down.” 

In fact, a variety of translations yield some variant of one of these two possibilities. 

Table 1. Translations of Psalm 104:8a[3] 

Translation	Agrees with: “They went up over the mountains and went down into the valleys”	Agrees with: “Mountains rose and the valleys sank down”
New American Standard		X
New International Version	X
King James Version	X
New King James Version	X
English Standard Version		X
Holman Christian Standard		X
English translation of the Septuagint	X
Revised Version (UK)	X
Amplified Bible		X
Good News Bible	X
New English Bible	X
Revised Berkley		X
J.N. Darby’s		X
Living Bible		X
New Living Translation		X
Jerusalem Bible	X
R.G. Moulton	X
Knox Version		X
The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text (a new translation by the Jewish Publication Society)		X
Revised Standard Version		X
Young’s Literal Translation	X
King James 21st Century Version	X
Geneva Bible		X
New Revised Standard Version	X
Webster’s Bible	X
New International Children’s Version		X
Interlinear Bible		X

Obviously, there is no consensus on translation among these English versions. Looking at other languages, we see how the Hebrew was translated. 

Table 2. Some Foreign Translations of Psalm 104:8[4] 

Foreign translation	Agrees with: “They went up over the mountains and went down into the valleys”	Agrees with: “Mountains rose and the valleys sank down”
Luther’s German		X
Menge’s German		X
French Protestant Bible (Version Synondale)		X
Italian Edizione Paoline		X
Swedish Protestant		X
Spanish Reina Valera		X
Latin Vulgate (by Jerome)		X
La Bible Louis Segond 1910 (French)		X
Septuagint (Koine Greek)		X

Notice that there doesn’t seem to be a discrepancy. Of course, there are many translations, so one cannot be dogmatic, but the point is that many foreign translations agree with “mountains rising and valleys sinking down.”

Hebrew 

In Hebrew, which reads right to left, the phrase in 104:8a is literally four words. Translated into English, the phrase in question is: 

biq‘ah	yarad	har	alah
valleys	down go/sink	mountains	up go/rise/Ascend

Take note that there are no prepositions like “over” or “into.” It is literally “up go mountains, down go valleys.” It makes sense why many translations, including non-English translations, use the phrase “mountains rose and the valleys sank down”—this is what it should be.

Why Would Commentators Miss This? 

Commentaries could easily misinterpret this passage if they were based on translations that agree with “they went up over the mountains and went down into the valleys.” For example, the most popular English translation for several hundred years, the King James Version (which I love by the way), reads this way. 

Furthermore, from a logical perspective, water doesn’t flow uphill over mountains, but rather the opposite. Given language like this, commentators likely attributed this to a miraculous event during Creation Week, when many miracles were taking place anyway; also, Creation Week was referenced earlier in the chapter. Of course, the problems came when reading the rest of the context. One excellent commentator, John Gill, regarding verse 9 and the waters not returning to cover the earth, stated: 

“That they turn not again to cover the earth; as they did when it was first made, #Ps 104:6 that is, not without the divine leave and power; for they did turn again and cover the earth, at the time of the flood; but never shall more.”[5] 

Gill was forced to conclude that the waters did return to cover the earth, and he justified their return on “divine leave and power”! Yet this would mean that God breaks promises. Because we know that God does not break promises, this must be referring to the end of the Flood. 

That said, we should understand the difficulty in commenting on the passage: it is a psalm of praise to God, and thus it is not as straightforward as literal history. It is difficult to determine where the shift from Creation to the Flood occurs and where the shift from Flood to post-Flood occurs. However, there are a few more hints in the text.

A Few More Comments 

We should use clear passages in Scripture to help interpret unclear passages. Consider that God’s “rebuke” would not exist in a perfect world, where nothing would need rebuking or correcting. (Remember, a perfect God created a perfect world—Genesis 1:31, Deuteronomy 32:4). One should expect nothing less of such a God.[6] 

Therefore, during Creation Week when everything was good, there would be no need for any rebuking. If Psalm 104:6–9 were referring to Creation Week (specifically Day 3), then why the rebuke in Psalm 104:7? This implies an imperfect, not very good creation. But if Psalm 104:6–9 is referring to the Flood, then of course a rebuke would exist in a fallen world where the judgment of water had overtaken the earth. 

Additionally, note that Psalm 104:9 is clearly referencing Genesis 9:8–16 in saying that the waters would not return to cover the earth. (Some have asked how mountains and valleys could move up and down when the foundations are identified as immovable in Psalm 104:5. Keep in mind that mountains and valleys are not the foundation, but like the seas, they all sit above the foundation. 

Lastly, note that when the land appeared in Genesis 1 on Day 3, the land that was being separated from the water was dry, not wet. The text in Genesis says that the waters were gathered into one place and then the dry land appeared. It says nothing of water flowing over the land to make it wet; otherwise, wet land would have appeared and then became dry.[7] But during the Flood, the land was indeed overtaken by water that eventually stood above the land.

Conclusion 

The Hebrew phrase in Psalm 104:8a is the basis for the correct translation of mountains rising and valleys sinking. This shows that mountains and valleys during the Flood were not the same height as they are today. Even today mountains and valleys are changing their height; volcanic mountains, for instance, can grow very quickly, such as Surtsey or Paricutin (a volcanic mountain in Mexico that formed in 1943). 

Therefore, with mountains and continents leveled out and oceans basin nowhere near the depth they are today, it makes perfect sense that Noah was not at the height of modern-day Mt. Everest. Instead, the Ark would have been at sea level, where oxygen would have been nearly the same as today at sea level. Noah and those aboard the Ark would not have required oxygen.

Originally here: http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2009/07/06/did-noah-need-oxygen; Republished by permission.

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[1] Scripture taken from the New American Standard Bible for this article.

[2] For cubit studies and lengths see: (for laymen) Hodge, B., How long was the original cubit?, Answers magazine, March 19, 2007. 

[3] Data was taken from two sources: (1) Charles Taylor, Did mountains really rise according to Psalm 104:8? TJ 12(3), 1998, 312–313, and (2) Looked up individually on Online Bible, Larry Pierce, February, 2009, or looked up separately.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Gill, J., Commentary notes, Psalm 104:9.

[6] It was due to man’s sin that the world is now imperfect and fallen.

[7] I understand some scientific models are built on this principle of land and water separating and then the land becomes dry. But the text of Scripture, I suggest, leans in the direction of dry land appearing as a more supernatural occurrence, as opposed to naturalistic; especially considering the context of a supernatural creation week. 

How Long Was The Original Cubit?

 How Long Was The Original Cubit?

Bodie Hodge, M.Sc., B.Sc., PEI

Biblical Authority Ministries, April 28, 2025

“And this is how you shall make it: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, its width fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits.” Genesis 6:15, NKJV

Do we really know the size of Noah’s Ark (Genesis 6:15), the Ark of the Covenant (Exodus 25:10), the altar (Exodus 38:1), Goliath (1 Samuel 17:4), and Solomon’s Temple (1 Kings 6:2)? 

While the Bible tells us that the length of Noah’s Ark was 300 cubits, its width 50 cubits, and its height 30 cubits, we must first ask, “How long is a cubit?” The answer, however, is not certain because ancient people groups assigned different lengths to the term “cubit” (Hebrew word אמה [ammah]), the primary unit of measure in the Old Testament.

Ark with a short cubit (Using the old box design); Image from Presentation Library.

Ark with a long cubit (Using the Lovett Design); Image from Presentation Library with added dimensions.

The length of a cubit was based on the distance from the elbow to the fingertips, so it varied between different ancient groups of people. Here are some samples from Egypt, Babylon, and ancient Israel:  

Culture	Inches (centimeters)
Hebrew (short)	17.5 (44.5)
Egyptian	17.6 (44.7)
Common (short)	18 (45.7)
Babylonian (long)	19.8 (50.3)
Hebrew (long)	20.4 (51.8)
Egyptian (long)	20.6 (52.3)

But when Noah came off the Ark, only one cubit measurement existed—the one he had used to construct the Ark. Unfortunately, the exact length of this cubit is unknown. After the nations were divided, years later at the Tower of Babel, different cultures (people groups) adopted different cubits. So it requires some logical guesswork to reconstruct the most likely length of the original cubit.

Since the Babel dispersion was so soon after the Flood, it is reasonable to assume that builders of that time were still using the cubit that Noah used. Moreover, we would expect that the people who settled near Babel would have retained or remained close to the original cubit. Yet cubits from that region (the ancient Near East) are generally either a common (short) or a long cubit. Which one is most likely to have come from Noah?

In large-scale construction projects, ancient civilizations typically used the long cubit (about 19.8–20.6 in [52 cm]). The Bible offers some input in 2 Chronicles 3:3, which reveals that Solomon used an older (long) cubit in construction of the temple.

Most archaeological finds in Israel are not as ancient as Solomon, and these more modern finds consistently reveal the use of a short cubit, such as confirmed by measuring Hezekiah’s tunnel. However, in Ezekiel’s vision, an angel used “a cubit plus a handbreadth,” an unmistakable definition for the long cubit (Ezekiel 43:13). The long cubit appears to be God’s preferred standard of measurement. Perhaps this matter did not escape Solomon’s notice, either.

Though the original cubit length is uncertain, it was most likely one of the long cubits (about 19.8–20.6 in). If so, the Ark was actually bigger than the size described in most books today, which usually use the short cubit.

This article is based on the research originally published by Tim Lovett at http://www.worldwideflood.com/ (which no longer exists).

Originally March 19, 2007 at http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/am/v2/n2/original-cubit; and featured in Answers Magazine Vol. 2, No. 2; Republished by permission.