Radar, Core Drills and a Broken Bit: What the 2026 Durupınar Team Is Reporting

For more than sixty years, a long, hull-shaped ridge in the hills of eastern Türkiye has drawn explorers, skeptics and believers. In the summer of 2026 it got the most intensive look in its recorded history. A team working under Turkish government permits ran a new 3D radar survey across it, collected about a thousand soil samples, and in September began pulling core samples from deep inside the outline.

The team believes it is looking at the remains of Noah’s Ark. That is its stated position, and it says so openly. Our job here is to lay out exactly what it has reported, where each claim comes from, and what still has to be tested before anyone can call anything confirmed.

The site

The Durupınar formation lies near the village of Üzengili in Ağrı Province, about 29 km (18 miles) south of the summit of Greater Mount Ararat and roughly 3 km north of the Iranian border, at an elevation of around 2,000 meters (about 6,500 feet), according to its Wikipedia entry. Its length is most often given as 157 meters, or 515 feet, the figure the 2026 team uses; some earlier surveys measured 164 meters (538 feet).

It is named for Captain İlhan Durupınar, a Turkish Army officer who noticed the shape in an aerial photograph in 1959. An expedition in 1960 dug and dynamited inside the outline for two days and, by the account in Wikipedia’s summary of the record, found only soil and rocks. The site was later promoted as the Ark by the amateur explorer Ron Wyatt, and it has been argued over ever since.

Who is doing the work

The 2026 project is led by Prof. Dr. Cenker Atila of the archaeology department at Sivas Cumhuriyet University, who serves as president of the project. His university says fieldwork began on June 28 with about 20 scientists from five countries. The American partner is Noah’s Ark Scans, a California group led by Andrew Jones, who is described as the group’s founder in the August release and as vice president of the Noah’s Ark Research Project in the September one. Ancient Content reports that the group has worked at the site since 2019, with ground-penetrating radar in 2019, electrical resistivity tomography in 2021 and soil dating in 2022.

Arkeonews reports that the field season lasted about 90 days.

August: the radar results

On August 18, Noah’s Ark Scans and Bakhtar Research and Engineering announced the first deployment of BakhtarRadar at the site. The system was built by Dr. Khosrow Bakhtar, whom the release describes as a scientist with four decades of detection-technology work for the U.S. Air Force, Navy, Defense Threat Reduction Agency and NORAD-USNORTHCOM. According to the release, it was originally developed as the Air Force’s “EarthRadar.”

The release listed three preliminary observations: the radar did not show the formation as a simple, uniform mass of rock; it detected “multiple strong subsurface anomalies and layering”; and in the deeper data processed so far, no clear bedrock boundary had been identified beneath the formation.

“We believe the Durupınar Formation is the remains of Noah’s Ark, and that is exactly why we want to put it through the strongest scientific testing we can.”Andrew Jones, Noah’s Ark Scans, Aug. 18, 2026 press release

News coverage added detail from the team’s briefings. Israel Hayom reported that, according to the team, the scans showed angular structures to a depth of roughly six meters (20 feet), a central corridor, and spaces arranged across three underground levels. Ancient Content reported a central corridor about 71 meters long and tunnel-like features about four meters below the surface. Jones has described the pattern as possible support beams and walls.

To its credit, the team’s own release included the most important caveat, and it is worth quoting in full:

“Failure to identify a bedrock boundary in the data processed so far does not by itself prove bedrock is absent, and radar anomalies alone do not prove an archaeological origin.”Noah’s Ark Scans, Aug. 18, 2026 press release

The same release also included a fundraising appeal for the drilling phase.

The carbon numbers

In an August 28 statement, Sivas Cumhuriyet University quoted Prof. Atila as saying the team’s soil samples showed about 40 percent more carbon inside the outline than outside it, which he said strengthens the possibility of wood or organic material at the site. Arkeonews repeated the figure, attributing it to the university.

That reading is not the only one on the table. Creationist geologist Dr. Andrew Snelling, commenting in 2025 on the group’s earlier soil results, offered a natural explanation: the rock inside the structure is limestone while the ground outside is mudflow debris, and a bowl-shaped structure collects more rainwater, which over time can produce a richer soil with more organic matter. Lab work on the new samples should help decide between these explanations.

September: the drill goes in

On September 23, Noah’s Ark Scans announced that core drilling had begun inside and outside the formation, with samples recovered from as deep as 18 meters. Jones described the results in the release:

“We have so far recovered layers of rich organic material that we believe could be the decayed top tier remains of the Ark. We are encountering multiple cavities, including one filled with mud and water. No bedrock or solid limestone has so far been identified in the holes drilled inside the formation.”Andrew Jones, Sept. 23, 2026 press release

The headline claim concerns a hard layer. According to Jones, in one hole inside the outline, about four to five meters below the surface, the drill struck “a layer so hard that the drill bit broke.” He said petrified or highly mineralized wood were both possibilities the team wants to investigate through third-party lab testing. Unconfirmed No one has yet identified what that layer is made of.

The release also said the team was preparing to send a small underground robot, which it calls the Gopher drone, into voids and corridors mapped by the radar.

Pottery and a thousand soil samples

Arkeonews and Anatolian Archaeology, both reporting on September 23, said the team collected roughly 1,000 soil samples from 150 locations, used the radar results to choose sampling spots, and recovered pottery fragments. The researchers suggested the pottery could date to a period before the Flood, but its age has not been established by any laboratory analysis. Unconfirmed

According to Arkeonews, Prof. Atila says the lab work will focus on organic material and possible wood remains. Where suitable material exists, radiocarbon dating is planned.

What we do not know yet

A careful reader should hold several points in mind:

• No peer review yet. Israel Hayom put it plainly: “None of the findings have been published yet in peer-reviewed research, only in press statements, and no wood remains, nails, or other man-made materials have ever been extracted from the site.”
• Radar needs ground truth. Radar images show contrasts underground. On their own they cannot tell a buried structure apart from natural layers, joints or cavities, which is why the cores matter.
• Interpretation matters. Dr. Snelling has cautioned that the radar features might “reflect” jointing and layering within the limestone, and that interpreters can read in what they expect to find.
• The pottery is undated. Anatolian Archaeology noted that the fragments “do not establish a historical flood or identify the formation as Noah’s Ark.”

At a glance: the claims and their status

When will we know more?

Arkeonews reports that Prof. Atila expects important laboratory findings during the winter of 2026–2027. The university plans to publish the first year’s findings in a volume titled Durupınar Formation 2026 Research, present them in three international conference papers, and complete the planned investigations in 2027.

That is the moment to watch. Radiocarbon dates, microscopic analysis of the hard layer, and the mineral content of the cores are the kind of evidence that can move this question beyond interpretation.

Our take

We would love for the Ark to be found, and we will report the lab results as soon as they are public, whichever way they point. Until then, the honest summary is “promising claims, not yet tested.” Faith in the Genesis account does not hang on this hillside. As Dr. Snelling put it, “we do not need to find Noah’s ark to be convinced that the global flood really occurred.”