Visitors observe a diorama depicting a caged dinosaur inside a replica Noah's Ark at the Ark Encounter theme park during a media preview day, Tuesday, July 5, 2016, in Williamstown, Ky. The long-awaited... (Associated Press) 
 
 Visitors observe a diorama depicting a caged dinosaur inside a replica Noah's Ark at the Ark Encounter theme park during a media preview day, Tuesday, July 5, 2016, in Williamstown, Ky. The long-awaited theme park based on the story of a man who got a warning from God about a worldwide flood will debut... (Associated Press) 
 
 WILLIAMSTOWN, Ky. (AP) — A 510-foot-long, $100 million Noah's ark attraction built by Christians who say the biblical story really happened is ready to open in Kentucky this week. 
 
 Since its announcement in 2010, the ark project has rankled opponents who say the attraction will be detrimental to science education and shouldn't have won state tax incentives. 
 
 "I believe this is going to be one of the greatest Christian outreaches of this era in history," said Ken Ham, president of Answers in Genesis, the ministry that built the ark. 
 
 Ham said the massive ark, based on the tale of a man who got an end-of-the-world warning from God about a massive flood, will stand as proof that the stories of the Bible are true. The group invited media and thousands of supporters for a preview Tuesday, the first glimpse inside the giant, mostly wood structure. 
 
 "People are going to come from all over the world," Ham said to thousands of people in front of the ark. 
 
 The ark will open to the public Thursday and Ham's group has estimated it will draw 2 million visitors in its first year, putting it on par with some of the big-ticket attractions in nearby Cincinnati. 
 
 The group says the ark is built based on dimensions in the Bible. Inside are museum-style exhibits: displays of Noah's family along with rows of cages containing animal replicas, including dinosaurs. 
 
 The group believes that God created everything about 6,000 years ago — man, dinosaur and everything else — so dinosaurs still would've been around at the time of Noah's flood. Scientists say dinosaurs died out about 65 million years before man appeared. 
 
 An ark opponent who leads an atheist group called the Tri-State Freethinkers said the religious theme park will be unlike any other in the nation because of its rejection of science. 
 
 "Basically, this boat is a church raising scientifically illiterate children and lying to them about science," said Jim Helton, who lives about a half-hour from the ark. 
 
 Ham said the total cost of the ark surpassed $100 million, a far cry from a few years ago, when fundraising for the boat was sluggish and much larger theme park plans had to be scaled back. 
 
 Millions of people first learned about plans for the ark during a debate on evolution between TV's Bill Nye "the Science Guy" and Ham in early 2014. 
 
 A few weeks later, a local bond issuance infused tens of millions of dollars into struggling fundraising efforts. And earlier this year, a federal judge ruled the ark could receive a Kentucky sales tax incentive worth up to $18 million while giving a strict religious test to its employees. 
 
 Months later, the tax incentive ruling still has some opponents of the boat scratching their heads. 
 
 "It's a clear violation of separation of church and state. What they're doing is utterly ridiculous and anywhere else, I don't think it would be allowed," Helton said. 
 
 The court ruled in January that Kentucky officials could not impose requirements on the ark that were not applied to other applicants for the tax incentive, which rebates a portion of the sales tax collected by the ark. That cleared the way for the group to seek out only Christians to fill its labor force. New applicants will be required to sign a statement saying they're Christian and "profess Christ as their savior." 
 
 Philip Steele, one of the thousands who got an early preview of the ark Tuesday, echoed Ham's often repeated comment that the sales tax generated by the ark wouldn't exist if the ark was never built. 
 
 "I just don't think they understand it," Steele said of the ark's critics. "They'll be able to keep a portion of (the sales tax) to further their ministry, but so be it." 
 
 When Ham was asked about the tax incentive at the Tuesday event, he drew loud cheers when he proclaimed no taxpayer money was used to the build the ark. 
 
 As much of a boon as the $18 million tax break would be, Bill Nye's agreeing to debate Ham may have helped turn the tide of years of sluggish fundraising. 
 
 Nye, a high-profile science advocate and former TV personality, debated Ham on evolution and drew a huge online audience. Nye later said he didn't realize the attention it would draw and said he was "heartbroken and sickened for the Commonwealth of Kentucky." 
 
 The video of the debate posted by Answers in Genesis on YouTube has 5.4 million views. 
 
 About three weeks after the debate, Ham announced that a bond offering from the city of Williamstown had raised $62 million for the project, and a few months later Answers in Genesis was breaking ground at the site of the ark. ||||| The Ark Encounter, based on proportions laid out in the Bible, is 510ft long, seven stories tall, and features model animals – including dinosaurs 
 
 God curbed his dramatic tendencies on Tuesday, neglecting to initiate a global flood during the figurative launching of a full-size Noah’s ark replica in Kentucky. 
 
 
 
 The Ark Encounter, based in the north of the Bluegrass state, is sculpted to proportions specified in the book of Genesis. It is 510ft long, seven storeys tall and, given its base is made of concrete, almost certain not to survive another of God’s watery caprices. (The vessel would displace – while sinking like a stone – 15,000 to 20,000 tons of water). 
 
 Answers in Genesis, a creationist religious organisation that believes God created the Earth in six days and that the world is 6,000 years old, is behind the modern-day ark, which will open to the public on 7 July. The group estimates that 1.4m people will visit the vessel in the first year and that the ark will bring $4bn to the Commonwealth of Kentucky. The ark is a non-floating exhibition offering both a glimpse into Noah’s life at sea and an opportunity to learn about Answers in Genesis’s theories on how our planet came to exist. 
 
 Facebook Twitter Pinterest Visitors tour the newly opened Ark Encounter. Photograph: Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA 
 
 For those making the journey to Williamstown, 50 miles north of Lexington, a genuinely impressive structure awaits. In fact the ark’s scale is such that even Charles, the taxi driver who dropped me off there on Tuesday morning and had never heard of the Ark Encounter, despite living only twenty miles away, was impressed. 
 
 “Wow,” he said as we pulled up at the ark’s port side. “That’s neat as hell.” 
 
 The whole ship looks like something one might find at Ikea: smooth lines, minimal design and a baffling assembly method 
 
 Neat is quite a good adjective for the ark’s exterior. It looks brand new and pristine. The pale yellow wood on its long hull – Radiata pine imported from New Zealand – brings to mind Ikea’s ubiquitous birch veneer furniture collection. In fact, the whole ship looks like something one might find at Ikea: smooth lines, minimal design and a baffling assembly method. 
 
 Answers in Genesis got the details for the build from measurements written in Genesis 6, in which God tells Noah the ark should be “300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high”. A cubit is roughly the distance from your fingers to your elbow – you can buy a “Noah’s cubit” in the gift shop. 
 
 Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Ark Encounter took far less time to build than Noah’s ark did, according to the Bible. Photograph: Aaron P. Bernstein/Getty Images 
 
 Noah’s ark, according to Answers in Genesis, took between 55 to 75 years to build. Once it was constructed, Noah herded the world’s animals, two by two, into the bowels of his vessel, where he tended to them until the flood receded. 
 
 Noah's Ark: the scientific version | Dean Burnett Read more 
 
 The Ark Encounter comfortably beat Noah’s construction time, having been assembled in less than two years. It holds no livestock, but has models of various creatures stored in wooden cages. 
 
 Creationists believe that rather than taking one of every modern species onboard the ark, Noah took ancestors of the animals we know today. According to this belief, the original ark would have held two early forms of canine, whose offspring developed into wolves, foxes, domestic dogs and other animals upon leaving the ark. As such, the model animals held on the Ark Encounter are approximations of what dogs’, cats’ and rhinos’ ancestors would have looked like. 
 
 There’s a cat-type mammal that has a head like a lion but is about the size of a big house cat. There’s something that looks like a rhino but without the horn. 
 
 Facebook Twitter Pinterest A visitor looks into a cage containing a model dinosaur on the ark. Photograph: John Minchillo/AP 
 
 And, given Answers in Genesis believes that dinosaurs walked the earth at the same time as man, there are also dinosaurs. Lots of them. There’s one which is akin to a brachiosaurus, with a long neck and tail. There’s one that looks like a stegosaurus, with spines on its back. There’s some sort of dwarf-T Rex, and a depressed-looking leathery-thing that might be related to a pterodactyl. 
 
 The animals are stored across three levels inside the ark. Huge wooden columns – tree trunks harvested in Washington and Montana – support each floor. The stern of the ship is free of animal storage, allowing visitors to see the curvature of the craft’s hull, with huge beams holding pine planks in place. 
 
 It succeeds in giving a sense of what it might have been like on the ark. Or on an old wooden ship. 
 
 The seafarers’ accommodations look like something Roger Moore’s James Bond might blunder into on a jaunt to Morocco 
 
 That impression is slightly spoiled by the presence of two Pepsi-branded refrigerators stocking a range of soft beverages, but – just as in Noah’s day – people do get thirsty. 
 
 The ark, which cost around $100m to build, has been the subject of some controversy. Answers in Genesis was awarded a tax break, reportedly worth $18m, by the state of Kentucky, allowing it to recoup taxes on money made from visitors. The break was rescinded after it emerged Answers in Genesis would only hire Christian staff members, but the organisation sued and won. 
 
 This June it also emerged that those wanting to work at the ark have to sign an agreement disavowing same-sex marriage and pre-marital sex. Staff and volunteers at the ark confirmed to the Guardian they had committed to the pledge. 
 
 Ken Ham, president and co-founder of Answers in Genesis, defended the Christian-only policy at Tuesday’s media preview. 
 
 “If you’re a religious organisation, you can have a religious preference in hiring. It makes sense. I can’t think of Planned Parenthood employing someone like me,” Ham said. 
 
 “Besides which,” he said, “this is going to create jobs outside of the ark.” 
 
 Answers in Genesis executives conducted interviews with the media on the third level of the ark, which, according to some accounts, is where the unclean animals were stored on the original. Thankfully, the top level of the Ark Encounter is instead home to a re-creation of the Noah family living quarters. 
 
 In this modern-day interpretation, Noah and his sons live in surprising luxury. The imagined seafarers’ accommodations look like something Roger Moore’s James Bond might blunder into on a jaunt to Morocco, complete with wooden latticing, red curtains and soft lighting. 
 
 To the rear of this soothing scene, Andrew Snelling, the organisation’s research geologist, sat down to chat. Snelling disputed the science that suggested the Earth is 4.5bn years old, citing testing Answers in Genesis had conducted. 
 
 “I know I’m rowing against the tide,” he acknowledged. “And I’m regarded as not a real scientist because I believe in creation, I believe in the flood.” 
 
 Facebook Twitter Pinterest Ken Ham says the Ark Encounter will create jobs ‘outside of the ark’. Photograph: Aaron P. Bernstein/Getty Images 
 
 In this area of Kentucky, there is a particularly large number of fossils, Snelling said. 
 
 “We’ve got limestone layers underneath the ark here and they’re full of marine fossils, clams, corals, those sort of shallow water marine invertebrates,” he said, which suggested that at some point there had been a global flood. 
 
 “So if you think about it, today we’re a thousand feet above sea level and we’re 500 miles from the ocean. 
 
 “Why aren’t the marine creatures buried in the oceans? That’s where they lived. But they’re actually buried up on the continents.”
– A massive, $100 million replica of Noah's Ark will open Thursday in Kentucky to—its builders hope—"undo the brainwashing" done to children by science, the Courier-Journal reports. According to the Guardian, the Ark Encounter, which was built by Answers in Genesis, is 510 feet long and seven stories tall. Ken Ham, president of Answers in Genesis, tells the AP he hopes it will prove that the Bible is true. The ark is filled with testaments to Answers in Genesis' beliefs: the Earth was created in six days and is only 6,000 years old, dinosaurs coexisted with humans, and Noah fit the ancestors of modern animals onboard. That last item has led to the replica's animal pens being filled with bizarre creatures, such as a house cat with a lion's head and some sort of hornless rhino. “In a world that we see becoming very secularized before our eyes, it’s really time for Christians to do something of this size,” Ham tells the Courier-Journal. Meanwhile, the paper states many people see the ark as an "embarrassing, entertainment-cloaked attack on science that uses tax incentives in violation of the separation of church and state.” A judge ruled Ark Encounter could get $18 million in tax incentives despite having a "strict religious test" for employees, who must be Christians and pledge to oppose same-sex marriage and pre-marital sex. The project was announced in 2010 but had trouble raising funds. Strangely, Bill Nye may have saved the ark by inadvertently drawing attention to it when he agreed to debate Ham about evolution. The noted Science Guy says he's "heartbroken and sickened" by Ark Encounter.