How did all the animals fit into the ark, and how were they distributed over the planet after the Flood of Noah’s day?

People who doubt the veracity of Bible records sometimes cast doubt on the record of the flood.

Answer

• The dimensions of the ark are given to us in the Bible. Using the standard cubit of 17.5 inches the ark was 438 feet long, 73 feet wide and 43.8 feet high.
• The ark had 3 decks (Gen 6v16) so the total deck area was approximately 95,700 square feet, and the total volume 1,396,000 cubic feet.
• The gross tonnage was approximately 13,960 tons, which is comparable to some large modern day vessels.
• Translated to standard railroad stock cars , that would each carry 240 sheep , there would be 522 rail cars in volume.
• The total number of sheep in a ship that size could have been 125,000.
• It is estimated that the average size of all the species would be much less than a sheep. There are not more than 100 animals that are bigger.
• We are also told in Gen 6v14 that there were rooms(pens) for the animals , plus food and there must have been living space for the humans on board.
• It has been estimated that there were 17,600 species of mammals , birds, reptiles and amphibians that would need to be in the ark. this gives us 35,200 animals
• Working on two of each species , with 5 extra each of clean animals (say 20% of species to be generous ) we add back 17,600 …so now we have a maximum of animals totalling about 53,000 sheep equivalents.
• So less than 50%of the available space would be needed for animals leaving plenty of space for food and humans.
• It is also likely that younger, and therefore smaller, animals were selected (and delivered) by God to Noah.
• Inside the ark were sufficient of each species to create the diverse gene pool we see today.
• The Bible clearly states that the animals were brought by God to Noah, and after the flood, we can only assume that God redistributed them as he saw fit, and to wherever he chose, even if this was overseas.

So we can see that there is no case to doubt the Genesis account on the basis of the size of the ark.

However we must still believe that God did the things recorded. 2Pet 3:3-7