Genesis 6:14 Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch. 15 And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of : The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits. 16 A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it.
The Bible tells us that the ark was 300 x 50 x 30 cubits. A cubit is the distance from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger. Of course it varies from person to person, but Bible scholars believe that it is between 17.5 and 24 inches. I use 18 inches which is on the small side. That means the ark was 450x75x45 feet. With three floors, there is a total floor space of 101,000 square feet. That means you could fit 50 houses with 2,000 sq. ft. each into the ark. According to various authors there was enough volume for between 500 and 550 railroad stock cars. A walk around the perimeter of the ark would be about 1.5 mile.
Let's design a model ark to help us picture it. If Noah was six foot tall and our model Noah is just 2 inches tall, how big is our model ark? (By the way, this is a 1/36 scale model.) Our model will be 12.5 feet long, 2 ft 1 in wide, and 1 ft 3 in tall. An adult giraffe would be just 5.6 inches high at this scale. A mouse would be .1-.2 inches long. Snakes would range from .1 inch to 8.3 inches. I hope these comparisons help.
To really get the feel for the ark, go to a large parking lot and measure off the full size ark. Then walk around it a few times. You'll become more sympathetic for Noah.
So the ark was big. Was it big enough for all the animals? Stay tuned.
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