by Daniel Phelps

Daniel Phelps is a retired environmental geologist for the commonwealth of Kentucky. He has also taught part-time in Kentucky’s Community College system. Phelps is founder and president of the Kentucky Paleontological Society. His work to expose the pseudoscience behind Ham’s Ark Encounter was featured in the award-winning 2019 documentary, “We Believe in Dinosaurs.” And in 2021 the Paleontological Society – the world’s leading scientific organization devoted to studying invertebrate and vertebrate paleontology, micropaleontology, and paleobotany – awarded Phelps the prestigious Strimple Award, which recognizes outstanding achievement in paleontology by someone who does not make a full-time living from paleontology.

Recently, Answers in Genesis CEO Ken Ham has produced a lot of propaganda celebrating the fact that the Ark has been open for 10 years in July. Propaganda that fails to acknowledge that  the Ark has never come close to the 1.2 to 2.2 million annual visitors projected by Answers in Genesis. 

But in early July, an Ark representative gave questionable testimony about Ark attendance to the Kentucky Legislature Committee on Tourism. A few days later the Kentucky House GOP posted this video to YouTube.  Apparently, Representative Kim King once counted 15 out of state license plates in the Ark parking lot! 

Wowie!

The purpose of the Tourism committee meeting – which consisted primarily of Ark propaganda – is unclear. Could the long-term goal be to give the Ark more tax incentives or some other Kentucky taxpayer money? At about 44 minutes in the Ark’s representative claims a million visitors a year, while Dr. William Trollinger, based on information from my monthly Kentucky Open Records Act requests, demonstrates the Ark has never come close to their attendance projections that were made when bullying the state, Grant County, and the City of Williamstown out of perks to build the Ark. (Note: These numbers don’t include free admission for children under 10 and yearly or lifetime pass holders.) 

In June 2026, the Ark sold 96,004 tickets according to my monthly Kentucky Open Records Act request. This is up 4,520 tickets compared to June of last year, but much lower than 2024 numbers. Although this is better than last year’s precipitous drop, it is still not good news for the Ark. 

Because the Ark will have been open ten years, it means the Ark’s $1.825 million/year sales tax incentive rebate will expire either in July, 2027 or at the end of the fiscal year. How will they adapt to losing this annual chunk of change from the Commonwealth of Kentucky’s teat? Will they get a Christian Nationalist legislator or perhaps a future Republican Governor to help them find more money from Kentucky’s treasury? (Perhaps a tax incentive package for their long-planned Tower of Babel reconstruction and ride?) 

I predict, at a minimum, the Ark will go from for-profit to non-profit so they won’t have to pay Williamstown the safety-fee money. Thus, Williamstown and Grant County will be on the hook for police, fire, and infrastructure costs for a non-profit ministry that once promised them streets of gold.

With gasoline and other expenses soaring, it will be interesting to see how the Ark amusement park fares in remaining summer months. Despite low ticket sales, the Ark and Answers in Genesis seems awash in cash. The Ark opened a new “Welcome Center” for visitors in March, presumably with more opportunities for visitors to spend money. It is amusing to see how outrageously expensive admission has become (adult 1 day tickets are approximately $55) and how the operators find new ways to all but vacuum money out of visitor’s pockets with extras such as the virtual reality rides ($16.50), zip lines ($59 to $144), tree sloth experience ($60), macropod (kangaroo and wallaby) experience ($40), bird of prey experience ($50), camel encounter ($5), mining sluice (mineral and fossil bags) ($10 to $55), plus guided Ark tours ($25), and parking ($15).

In any case, these numbers indicate that the Ark will never come near the 1.2 to 2.2 million projected by Answers in Genesis when they were begging and bullying for financial perks from various governmental entities. 

P.S.

by William Trollinger

I am sure it goes without saying that Ken Ham never acknowledges how Ark attendance has fallen far short of the projections made when, to quote Dan Phelps, “bullying the state, Grant County, and the City of Williamstown out of perks to build the Ark.” According to those projections, Ark attendance in Year 8 of its existence would have been at just about 2.5 million; at 682,101 visitors, the Ark reached but 27% of its projected attendance. 

This failure to come close to their own attendance predictions may explain why Ken Ham has taken to making the case that The Ark Encounter, which teaches the gospel clearly through various exhibits, attracts many non-Christian visitors – they make up about 30% of its total visitors – and our extensive guest surveys reflect that an estimated 70,000+ people a year trust Christ for salvation as a result of their visit. I would call that a fantastic investment in people’s eternity.

Oh my. Here are just a few observations about Ham’s claim:

1. Sue Trollinger and I have visited the Ark numerous times, and the notion that 30% of Ark visitors (in year 8,204,630 individuals) are “non-Christian” seems, well, ludicrous. Listening to our fellow visitors, and talking with others who have visited the Ark, it has been obvious that the vast majority of folks in attendance are evangelicals and fundamentalists. Of course, these numbers come from Ham and company, and besides everything else, they are the ones deciding which folks qualify as “non-Christian.” (Fundamentalists who have “backslidden,” perhaps?)
2. Accepting their numbers as legitimate, this would mean that in Year 8 61,389 individuals decided to “trust Christ for salvation as a result of their visit.” Again, this seems, well, ludicrous. Again, these numbers come from Ham and company. But perhaps the Ark’s extreme emphasis on Hell – represented here by the global Flood which (according to Ark placards) drowned up to 20 billion (billion, not million) individuals – so frightened 61,839 individuals in Year 8 that they claimed a religious experience. Maybe it is like the camps I attended as an adolescent, when the sermons on hell inevitably resulted in evangelical teenagers (often the same teenagers, year after year after year) streaming forward to “rededicate” their lives to Christ.
3. The overwhelming emphasis on Hell makes obvious what sort of “gospel” the Ark is teaching so “clearly.” A gospel of eternal torture for the vast majority of human beings. Sermon on the Mount? Matthew 25? Not so much.