A team scanning a boat-shaped hill in eastern Turkey has announced that new radar images show a large man-made structure underground, not just natural rock. 

On Wednesday, private research group Noah’s Ark Scans released a preliminary report about their work at the Durupınar Formation in Turkey's Ağrı Province, claiming that the 515-foot boat-shaped mound contained a 'man-made object.'

The scans were conducted by Dr Khosrow Bakhtar, an engineer who spent decades building detection systems for US defense agencies, including the Air Force, Navy and NORAD.

He used a system he invented called BakhtarRadar, originally developed to find buried tunnels and hidden structures, to scan beneath the boat-shaped Durupınar mound and see whether it was solid natural rock or a man-made structure.

That process has now concluded that the object under the Durupınar mound is not a natural rock formation, but a large organized man-made object with corridors, chambers and hallways inside.

In a statement sent to the Daily Mail, Dr Bakhtar said: 'Whatever the object is beneath the surface is extraordinary.'

'In forty years of this work, I have never seen anything like it. It could be a ship. It could be a spaceship. What I can say from the radar is that it is organized, it is structural, and a solid geological mass would not have returned such a strong signature.'

According to the Bible, the massive vessel saved humanity and every kind of animal from annihilation during a catastrophic flood that some biblical chronologies place more than 4,300 years ago. 

Bakhtar said the new radar images do not look like ordinary rock, mudflow or a solid natural hill in Turkey.

Instead, they showed organized internal features, including repeating lines and angles, open passageways, corridors, chambers and hallway-like spaces running the length of the alleged vessel trapped underground.

Bakhtar told the Daily Mail in a statement that the radar is designed to hide ordinary natural features such as rock and highlight buried structures, open spaces and man-made materials.

Since those complex patterns still appeared strongly in the scans, the team concluded the object was not a natural geological formation, pointing to the belief that this is the site of the ship constructed to survive the biblical Great Flood being true.

'Natural ground does not organize itself into corridors, chambers and hallways,' Dr Bakhtar explained.

'The system was built to separate buried structure from host geology, tunnels, voids, worked materials, discontinuities. That is what it is seeing here. A solid geological mass would not have returned this signature.'

The first major radar survey in 2019 detected linear and angular anomalies the team interpreted as possible walls, passageways and separate compartments. 

Core drilling for samples of the structure began in late September 2026 under the direction of a Turkish university-led field program. 

The first holes drilled struck a very hard layer about 12 to 15 feet down inside the Durupınar Formation. Those samples are being sent to outside labs for further testing.

The team previously revealed to the Daily Mail that those drilling samples of rich in organic material were being tested to determine whether it contained decayed wood. 

The full radar scan is expected to be completed by November 2026, with more lab results coming later.

The next major step in this ongoing investigation will be testing for animal DNA inside the structure. 

In the Bible’s Book of Genesis, chapter 6, verses 19-20, the flood story says God told Noah to bring male and female pairs of each kind of animal onto the ark so they could survive.

Noah’s Ark Scans revealed that they are in talks with scientists who specialize in recovering and reconstructing ancient and extinct animal DNA from pieces of deteriorating material, such as old bones, teeth or other remains that have been buried for millennia.

Andrew Jones, Vice President of the Noah’s Ark Research Project and founder of Noah’s Ark Scans, said in Wednesday's announcement: 'We now know we are looking at a massive, 515-foot, boat-shaped man-made structure with organized patterns and corridors in the Mountains of Ararat, where Genesis places the Ark.'

'The challenge is how we prove this is the vessel that preserved living creation through a catastrophic flood. That proof will not come from another scan. It will come from identifying and confirming ancient animal DNA inside the voids Dr Bakhtar mapped inside the structure.'