US team plans first dig at Mount Ararat’s ship-shaped hill

· April 28, 2025

The Durupınar hill. (photo credit: Kasbah. Via Shutterstock) — The Durupınar hill.

(photo credit: Kasbah. Via Shutterstock)

Ground-penetrating radar carried out by the group has revealed what members describe as “a rectangular structure” lying several metres below the surface.

A California research collective known as Noah’s Ark Scan says it will begin the first controlled excavation of the Durupınar Site on Mount Ararat’s southern flank once a preservation framework is in place with local universities.

“After securing additional information in cooperation with local universities in Turkey, we will establish a site-preservation plan and confirm whether the structures discovered through radar scans are artificial or natural,” the team told the Korean outlet FN News.

Ground-penetrating radar carried out by the group has revealed what members describe as “a rectangular structure” lying several metres below the surface. The anomalous shape sits inside a flat, oval hill some 160 metres long—almost exactly the length assigned to Noah’s Ark in Genesis.

Soil samples taken during earlier seasons by Turkish and American geologists contained clay, marine sediments and mollusk fragments dated to between 3,500 and 5,000 years ago. Those results, published last year, placed the material in the Copper Age, a horizon some historians link to large flood traditions.