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by Spero News
Evangelical explorer, author and lecturer Bob Cornuke has followed the Exodus route of Moses, dived the Red Sea in search of Pharaoh's chariots, searched for the lost Ark of the Covenant in Israel and Ethiopia, sought in Malta's ocean beds the four anchors from the shipwreck of St. Paul, and traveled through Eastern Turkey with Apollo 15 astronaut James Irwin. To the above, his research and findings regarding Mt. Sinai have been chronicled by Discovery, the History Channel, and National Geographic Television. This past summer Cornuke, a former crime scene investigator turned relic hunter, culminated more than 20-years of painstaking research and reconnaissance by climbing Iran’s Mt. Soleiman in search of Noah’s Ark. Decades of previous expeditions by noted historians, scientists, and explorers have centered the focus of the search on Mt. Ararat in Turkey which, to-date, has been widely-believed, but never proven, to be the landing site of the Ark. But Cornuke has always been focused on the mountainous regions of Iran as the likely landing place for he Ark; retracing the steps and accounts of Ed Davis, an army officer stationed in Iran in 1943. Davis, who passed a lie detector test, claims to have been taken to the Ark's resting place, and was able to offer both a detailed verbal account, and drawings of what he had seen. Relying on instincts honed from years in law enforcement, and a Biblical interpretation that points toward the Ark's ultimate destinations being further east than traditionally thought, as well as the disappointing lack of progress in finding any evidence of boats that other alleged eyewitnesses claimed to see on Mount Ararat - which Cornuke has climbed several times - led him to believe that Davis' story was worth investigating. Braving treacherous climbing conditions, and a hostile political environment, Cornuke says he discovered evidence of an altar site, and a structure that geological experts theorize could have been “hand-hewed.” He returned from Mt. Soleiman with numerous samples, photos, and video footage, and has chronicled the journey in a new book, Ark Fever (Tyndale House Publishers). Testing of rock and shell samples were conducted by BETA Analytic Inc., the largest professional radiocarbon dating laboratory in the world, which routinely services world governments and major academic and historical institutions such as the Smithsonian Institute. Results of this carbon dating, which is still on-going, indicate the presence of abundant organic material consistent with coming from a quiescent deep-water environment – in layman’s terms, possibly from a world once immersed in water. Evidence of petrified wood was also brought back, and a world-wide team of experts is studying all materials. As for Cornuke, he awaits a break in the harsh Iranian winter so that he and a team can return to Mt. Soleiman for further investigation, where he is optimistic that a veil will be lifted on a centuries-long quest for the greatest Bible legend ever chronicled. Cornuke believes the discovery of the ark would rock the archaeological world, and cause many skeptics to take a renewed look at the historical authenticity of the bible. As Dr. Mellville Bell Grovesnor, the late editor of National Geographic once said, “If the ark of Noah is discovered, it will be the greatest archaeological find in human history, the greatest event since the resurrection of Christ, and it would alter the currents of scientific thought.” http://www.speroforum.com/site/article.asp?idCategory=33&idsub=128&id=2424 |