Let's make a second Bible: Noel's Ark

Question

Phone message to you, Noel, on 10th October 2016 (AD):

Hey, Noel, it's Rudolf Jelínek here. God just send me a message on Facebook (I know it's true, because god gave me a vision in my sleep):

Dear Rudolf,

I saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil or Facebook continually. And it angered me that I had made man on the earth, and it grieved me at my heart. And I said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it angers me that I have made them.

But you and Noel found grace in the eyes of mine:

As I looked upon the Earth, and, beholded, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted it's [sic] way upon the Earth. The end of all flesh is to come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through and through; I shall destroy them with a flood, like I already did it. I shall flood the Earth, sink all ships and malfunction all orbital devices. I also decided I will save you from the flood and warn you, for I think you are very decent and honest people I like your names. Make thee an Ark of whatever you want; rooms shalt thou make in the Ark.

And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the Earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, under heaven; and every thing that is in the Earth shall die. But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the Ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons’ wives with thee. And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the Ark, to keep them alive with thee; they shall be male and female.
Of fowls after their kind, and of cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind; two of every sort shall come unto thee, to keep them alive.

And take thou unto thee of all food that is to be eaten, and thou shalt gather it and store it; and it shall be food for you, and for the beasts.

Seven days from now, I will cause it to rain upon the earth for forty days and forty nights; and every living substance that I have made will I destroy from off the face of the earth.
And the waters will prevail upon the earth a hundred and fifty days.

Yours, sincerely,

God

And a few seconds later I got this:

PS. Don't forget to tell Noel, you shall not take anybody else except your close family with you, or you shall die painfully, in corruption.

Long story short (after finding a dictionary), here's a summary:

• We have 7 days to make/obtain a giant boat

• The boat should be able to:

  • Carry a pair of each type of animal (only the most important species - at maximum how much types a zoo has - the largest zoo in the world has 1500 species on 84 acres)

  • Survive 40 days of rain and 150 days on water

  • Have enough food for up to 1500 animal pairs and 2 5-people families

• We should not tell anybody, nor should anybody find out.

• God gave me a check for a few millions (or was it billions? How I hate my dislexia...) of dollars.

---

I guess we will die a painful death by posting this here, because you, Noel, are not the only one reading this (what about the Stackexchange moderators), but next Monday (Why! Why does it have to be a Monday!) the world will end as we know it.

So, many questions come up, and I don't know how to answer them: Is this technically feasible? Can such a project be achieved? How big should such a ship be, and can we obtain it in a week? Can we do this without anybody noticing?

Footnote: I'm not trying to make fun of Christianity on its behalf here, and I'm a believer too.

Answer 1

Tell Everyone It's a Floating Zoo and Christian Libertarian Paradise.

How do we do it? We use what @GrinningX casually dismissed.

Let's cross the aircraft carrier off the list because those just aren't for sale to private parties.

Oh but they are. The HMS Illustrious is for sale, but it's too small for our needs. In fact, every ship is too small. But what's interesting for our purposes is the Chinese recently bought and unfinished Ukrainian (originally Soviet) aircraft carrier claiming it was for a "theme park". Instead it was fixed up and the Chinese military is using it for gaining experience in carrier operations.

We'll do the same thing. Pose as a rich nut who wants to make a floating zoo and libertarian paradise. You'll homestead in international waters and be free from Earthly laws! You can do all sorts of crazy things in full view of the public because it's all for your self-sustaining new Atlantis!

First, we need to get rid of a few unreasonable client requirements.

There's no way you can even buy a boat of the necessary size in 7 days, much less fit it out to carry a self-contained zoo for 40 days. It's ok, clients make unreasonable demands all the time. Just renegotiate with God, Abraham did it all the time.

Clients love to tell their contractors how to do their job. We need to remind God that if they want that sort of control, they're going to have to hire us as an employee. God tells us what result they want, their budget and time frame, and we make it happen... or tell them it's bollocks.

We're gonna need a bigger boat, and more of them.

I have bad news, God. We've crunched the numbers and I don't see how this is going to work with just one boat. You say your previous contractor got the job done with a 145 m x 24 m x 14 m hull... but I don't know how to do that. Did you inspect his work? Maybe he was putting you on.

No boat on Earth can hold 84 acres. That's 340,000 m² or 582 m x 582 m. The largest supertankers on Earth are 380 m x 68 m and that's their external dimensions. You'd need 20 decks just for the animals, let alone storage for food, water, and supplies. Nope, God will just have to drop the nostalgia factor and allow us to have a fleet.

While we could get away with less space than a zoo, zoos don't have to store all their food, water, and supplies for 40 days.

This also solves the problem of maintaining different biomes. I know you can get the lamb to lie down with the lion, that'll be a big help thank you, but I don't think you can get the polar bear to like the same temperature and humidity as the rhinoceros. If we had just one ship we'd have to climate control each compartment separately to simulate all the major biomes, complex and time consuming. With a fleet each ship only needs to simulate one biome.

We're gonna need more money.

God, we're gonna need to nail you down on a budget. We're gonna need that billion to buy the hulls, tow them, refurbish their engines and seakeeping equipment, gut them, and redesign them to hold a floating zoo.

A global flood you say? Heavy currents? Wild seas? Constant rain? And a ship full of live cargo? We're gonna need some serious anti-roll and ship-keeping technology.

And the faster you want to do that, the more money it's gonna take. Which comes to the next problem...

We're gonna need more time.

We have 7 days to make/obtain a giant boat.

Look, God, I know you're all excited to wipe out wickedness in humanity ASAP, but you've waited a few thousands years to do it... again... are you sure this is legal? I mean, you're still advertising that covenant with the rainbows and all... well, that's for the legal department.

Point is, you can wait a few more years. You're putting all your eggs in one basket, let's be sure we get it right. I'd even suggest we allow time for a test run, take the fleet out for 40 days, see how we do, fix any bugs. That way when it's showtime and civilization is 50 meters under water, we don't realize 3 days in that we forgot something.

We're gonna need more people. A lot more people.

I'm sorry, God, but I'm not a sailor and neither is anyone in my family. 5 untrained adults cannot manage one supertanker, in a storm, much less a whole fleet of them. Plus feed, water, and care for thousands of animals. And take care of the kids.

With my story that I'm building a Christian Libertarian Paradise, I'll hire on only devout families who are willing to relocate to my floating city. Then I can have as large a pool of labor and sailors as I need.

Also about the two of every creature thing... genetics says no. I know some of your followers aren't big fans of evolution, but that seems to be the way you set things up, and who am I to question your work? We're going to need a much bigger breeding pool than just two families. That'll kill two birds with one stone.

Then we go about building it in full view of the public.

No need to hide or LIE, I hear that's an important value to you, God. We tell everyone we're building a Floating Zoo and Christian Libertarian Paradise to live in international waters. And that's just what we're doing.

Now we can get the people, animals, and supplies without being secretive. We can purchase old cargo, tanker, and military hulls and refurbish them at normal dockyards. This will make things faster and cheaper. It won't cause a panic because we're just another crazy Christian utopian community.

With the extra time you've given us, we can set sail, do a few test cruises, work out the bugs, and be ready at sea for launch day in say... how's 2021 for you?

Answer 2

No, Not Remotely Possible

Let's consider a few things...

1. You Need to Buy the Boat

You can't build such a boat in a week, it's simply not possible. The Amish can build a barn in about a day, but that's a community full of Amish building a simple structure that doesn't need to be seaworthy and which can hold many fewer than two of every type of animal. And they're experts. Allowing 6 more days does not solve the significant logistic issues you would have.

2. You Can't Buy the Boat in a Week

You need a gigantic boat. Without even getting into research I'm sure you're looking for something along the size of the largest floating things we make, which would be something like an oil tanker, large cargo boat, or large aircraft carrier.

Let's cross the aircraft carrier off the list because those just aren't for sale to private parties.

The oil tanker and cargo boats both have the same issue - they're booked... for years. Those things cost a lot of money to build - not just 1 or 2 million - and what they are going to do is planned out well in advance. But you have money, so plans can change. Unfortunately for you, the average dock-hand can't simply sell you the ship - you'll need to go in front of a board of directors for the owning company to make your pitch. Getting that appointment may take you months, and the board will likely take a week or more to decide.

Once you have agreement that you can purchase your large boat though, there are those pesky regulations. Countries and port authorities need to know about the change and will ask why you need the boat. You will also need to register a place to park it.

3. Where Do You Get Your Animals in a Week?

Most people can maybe - just maybe - find a place to board their cat and dog in a few days... but you're going to amass 3,000 exotic animals in a week?

Let's say that each exotic animal requires a vet check or some paperwork at least... that's 3,000 pieces of paperwork you need to go through. Over 7 days that's 428 individual pieces of paperwork you need to negotiate/sign per day. I'm not sure where you find the time!

For that matter, where did you find the animals? Per day, you need to track down 428 individual animals and verify their sex (2 males or 2 females won't do you much). Assuming you don't need sleep, you're processing 1 animal every 3.36 minute!

4. People Will See You Loading Your Animals

Your boat is big. You need a place that can accommodate a large boat and the infrastructure needed to bring animals to it. That's a job for a commercial dock; there's no other choice. Commercial docks though are busy places full of people. They are also often controlled by a body which coordinates shipments into and out of the area, to ensure the roads and water lanes remain open. You'll be filing your plans with that group or you won't be going forward with them!

5. Food

Not all animals eat the same thing, and many eat each other! Do you think you could figure out the nutritional requirements for 1,500 species of animals in a year - let alone a week?

6. Ehhh... nuts to this

The smallest amount of consideration of this problem has shown it's not possible. There are plenty of other reasons, but it is pretty trivial to demonstrate. I'm ending here.

Answer 3

Can you get your hands on a really virulent cross-species plague virus and a distribution vector? If you can exterminate most of the species on the planet before Monday, you can use a small yacht to carry two of the few that remain.

What? You're concerned about all the extinct species? Don't be. With only 2 of each species on board, those that you save will be extinct in a few years anyway. Your plague is just hastening the process in order to comply with God's wishes.

Now, if God asks you to save a breeding population of the major species, that's a larger undertaking. I don't think you can finish by Monday.

Answer 4

One possibility you may want to look into is 3D printing. So far there are quite a few projects that are working on making safe, livable houses and mansions that are 3D printed. A few groups claim that their printers will be able to print a few story house with in a few days. With your god-given check, you could purchase a few of these, claim you are printing a few (or 100) extensions for your home. The material should be water resistant and quite durable.

A few links to look at

https://all3dp.com/biggest-3d-printers-world/

P.S. for the food, they also have a few printers for that:

https://www.naturalmachines.com/

and they have a candy printer for dessert (can't share link as this is my first post)

Good luck with your Ark, Sincerely Human w

Answer 5

This can be done, but would envolve a huge lot of people (who would left behind?).

1) Oasis of the Seas. is 360x60 m about 2 acres (it is not square). BUT it has 16 livable decks! It gives us 36-40 acres of space. Since we need a barn, not a zoo - we do not need all 84 of it's acres (wich include such usefull things as cafes and wide observation areas). So it would be enouph area (about 100 m^2 per each animal!) to hold animals and food for them for half an year. With good timing (God is on your side!) you can "catch" it in a port with a large airport nearby. Say at Hong Kong (I know she never goes there, but God will help us!), or Rome.

You will need a army of lawers to get ownship in one day. It doesn't matter when deal would be actually closed - it wouldn't. Thanks God, you would not even need to pay the money!

And you will need an actual mercenary army to quikly take control of the ship and get rid of all passangers - that were airport come in handy. You will still need the crew for loading procedure. As with all money buisness - you may pay mercenaries with promises. They are all dead in less than a week.

This operation should take no more than 2 days - 1 for preparations, 1 for implementation.

2) Animals is the hardest part. You can't transfer a zoo in a week. But you needn't. You should orginise transfer from as many zoos and animal reserves as possible. Since you have only 5 days left - you need to load 300 animals per day - about 5 min per animal. You should hire some top logistic company to do this on day 0 - they would need time and lot of money to prepare, but it is doable. Airport and good road net would come in handy also. I can't name somthing of this complexitiy, but I know some cases when huge device consiting of thousand parts were dissasambled, transfered, assembled and started in a week (for a price of cause).

3) Food is easer to gather - you can use local food in most cases. I hope God does it at autmn after harvest. Meat for carnivores should be alive: sheeps, goats, mice (for snakes). But it is still a chalenging logistic task, since it should go synchroniosly with animal loading (some birds would die in a hour without food).

4) Of cause there would be no total secrecy or "out of eyes" operation. As one wise man said, "... or you can lie everybody for short period of time" - exactly our case! You don't even need to lie or explain anything. It would such a rush and mess, that no one would have time to ask any questions! And if they ask them just tell them to wait for a week or so and give them more money to do their job. You would need an information suppresion company to shut up all tne media for that week. It is more than doable: it is and was done recently a lot of times.

5) The most dangerous part - is to seal the ship and take her of coast. You do not need to control it - tugboat would do all the job. But when the flooding starts all you mercenary army and former crew would have a strong wish to join you cruise. So I suggest you to orginaze the second ship "takeover" at day 5 and send all you men to "help" on that decoy ship at day 7 (you would need 10-20 airplains to do that), so they would have no possibility to assault your "Ark".

6) During "cruise" you don't need to control the ship - you don't even need to rise the anchor. Ships use "hanging" anchors in deep sea to stay relativly in place. All your conserns would be about feeding this "zoo" - it would take about couple dozens of people to do it without hollydays.