# Rate of Precipitation during Noah's Flood **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 16, 2004, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004 "2004-11-16T04:00:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/21 "2004-11-16T21:36:04Z")
Here is a [link](http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/hovind/howgood-add.html#A2) to the talk.origins page describing some of the issues of the supposed Flood, many of which would boil off the atmosphere. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/22 "2004-11-16T21:55:08Z")
With God, all things are possible. So it could have appeared as nothing more than a gentle rain, not even a torrent but just your average April afternoon, except that as each raindrop hit the ground it magically expanded into a volume of water equal to Lake Titicaca. Bam! ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/23 "2004-11-16T22:03:47Z")
> [@](#): > > "Alice laughed: “There’s no use trying,” she said; “one can’t believe impossible things.” > > “I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” Lewis Carroll, \*Alice in Wonderland. \* ---
**Author:** ![kniz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@kniz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kniz)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2004, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/24 "2004-11-16T22:13:25Z")
[**Another relivant link**](http://home.inu.net/skeptic/flood.html) > [@](#): > > \*\* there is an upper limit, in the region of 300 feet, on the length of a wooden ship. Beyond this a wooden ship is subjected to great stress and the hull cannot be maintained watertight. > > Another real-world problem for those believing this story is meteorology. Genesis 7:19-20 state that all earth was covered by 15 cubits (approximately 25 feet) of water. In order to cover Mt. Everest by 25 feet–over 29,000 feet above sea level–over a span of 10 months (Gen. 8:5)-- it would have had to rain an average of 6 inches per minute for the entire time. The record for rainfall for any one-minute at any one location is 1.5 inches. Also, if all that vapor was in the air before the rain started, the air pressure at sea level would be an astounding 13,000 psi instead of the normal 14.5 psi. > > In the literature of ancient Egypt, the most powerful and most advanced nation in the world at the alleged time of the Great Flood, there is no mention of a catastrophic flood of world wide proportions. If such a flood had occurred, all of the Egyptians would have been drowned. That obviously didn’t happen.\*\* ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/25 "2004-11-17T00:31:07Z")
> [@](#): > > Any ways, being in the USN for a short time now, I know that ships are mostly water tight. Very few windows, if any, and, all carry a good amount if water in their ballast tanks. Also, keep in mind that the CVN’s (nuclear powered aircraft carriers) hold 5000 or so people… Against God??? ---
**Author:** ![Odinoneeye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/97f17d/32.png) [@Odinoneeye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odinoneeye)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/26 "2004-11-17T03:00:50Z")
> [@](#): > > In the literature of ancient Egypt, the most powerful and most advanced nation in the world at the alleged time of the Great Flood, there is no mention of a catastrophic flood of world wide proportions. If such a flood had occurred, all of the Egyptians would have been drowned. That obviously didn’t happen. But wasn’t the flood supposed to be before there were Egyptians? I thought after the flood was the tower of Babel, and because of the different languages after that event, people spread around the world. Of course, I’m about as far from being a biblical scholar as you can get without actually being a Christian. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![kniz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@kniz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kniz)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/27 "2004-11-17T04:05:54Z")
> [@Odinoneeye](#): > > But wasn’t the flood supposed to be before there were Egyptians? I thought after the flood was the tower of Babel, and because of the different languages after that event, people spread around the world. This is something I’ve never seen before but it isn’t hard to figure out. Abraham left Ur with his sheep, camels, wives, etc. and went to the Promised Land. Then Joseph went to Egypt and the family followed. Bible scholars have set a certain period of time that this happened after the flood. Present day scholars have some idea of which pharaohs Joseph might have served under. They also know how many years the Egyptian civilization had been around before those particular Pharohs. So now we have figures of how long it was from the flood to Joseph and how long Egypt had been around before the pharaohs that might have been involved. It doesn’t seem unreasonable to me that the Egyptians had been around longer. When the Bible was written they didn’t know or care about Egypt’s history. ---
**Author:** ![busterpickle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@busterpickle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/busterpickle)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/28 "2004-11-17T04:07:05Z")
Since we are talking about when the flood happened, I don’t know if anyone saw this particular NOVA/Discovery/National Geo/I can’t remember episode. BUT, the great flood is believed to be a story from eons and eons go. And, it actually pertained to the Aegean Sea or Adriatic Sea formation. Basically, there was a huge earth berm seperating the Med from either of those two seas and it gradually broke down and flooded the entire area. Of course, as you can imagine, this would in fact be a great flood. And, to prove it, these scientists (or whoever) actually went underwater and examined the ground and saw the fractures in the ground and telltale erosion that could only occur from such a thing. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/29 "2004-11-17T05:33:04Z")
> [@kniz](#): > > So now we have figures of how long it was from the flood to Joseph and how long Egypt had been around before the pharaohs that might have been involved. It doesn’t seem unreasonable to me that the Egyptians had been around longer. Except that the flood was supposed to have killed off everyone on earth save Noah and his immediate family. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2004, 8:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004/30 "2004-11-17T08:07:42Z")
> [@bup](#): > > Except that the flood was supposed to have killed off everyone on earth save Noah and his immediate family. Which is a bit of a problem with the flood story. In the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NY you can see Chinese pottery extending back, with clear stylistic similarities, long before the flood was supposed to happen. So perhaps there were people there who were living in China before the flood and got replaced by Noah’s descendents, but it is quite odd that they would pick up the art where it left off. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rate-of-precipitation-during-noahs-flood/275004.md?page=1)