Creation Science Rebuttals

Institute for Creation Research

Dinosaur Tracks and Noah's Flood

ICR News, 25 January 2013

First Published 5 Feb 2013

Is it me, or does it seem like every time a young earth creationist observes scientific evidence of a water/flood event, they automatically claim that "Noah's Flood did it!" That seems to be the case again in the Institute for Creation Research's article "New Dinosaur Tracks Study Suggests Cataclysm."¹

The article discusses the Lark Quarry Dinosaur Trackways in Australia, where fossilized footprints of about 150 small dinosaurs are preserved. The first studies of the trackway suggested that this was a dinosaur stampede, as they fled from a predator. A new study just published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology suggests the tracks were made not by a stampede, but by swimming/wading dinosaurs. The ICR author, Brian Thomas, gives details of the new study, and quotes the authors as saying "The sedimentologic and ichnological observations are consistent with interpretations of the area being a fluvial-dominated floodplain under variable subaqueous conditions."² Concerning this quote, Thomas states, "The word "fluvial" refers to river action. But the sandstone formation may be as large as the entire state of Queensland. Are they suggesting that there was a river as wide as Queensland? A great flood would make more sense."

Thomas needs to go back and read their quote again. They stated that it was a fluvial-dominated floodplain, not a river. A floodplain is an area of land adjacent to a stream or river, into which the river floods when the waters rise above the banks of the river. Yes, the word fluvial refers to river action, but all floodplains are the result of a river overflowing its banks. In reality, a floodplain can be hundreds of miles wide. In the image to the right, the river's floodplain is normally dry land, until the river overflows its banks, and fills the floodplain (light green).³

In the Google Earth image, you can clearly see the floodplain of the Mississippi River. It is the lighter green area on each side of the river.

Thomas states that "A great flood would make more sense." A great flood is exactly what the authors of the study suggest! It's a floodplain...you get floodplain deposits from...a flood! Amazing how that works.

Next he mentions the BEDS hypothesis, a young earth theory that claims that the water level during Noah's Flood was not consistent, but due to the water sloshing across broad, flat landscapes, water levels rose and fell locally, temporarily exposing land. This "sloshing" conveniently provided a place for dinosaurs and other creatures to leave their footprints. Apparently this hypothesis is supposed to explain how you can have footprints at different stratigraphic levels. While YECs will accept that explanation, it doesn't make sense when you look at the stratigraphic location of dinosaur trackways. The image at right (from this website) shows trackway locations within a 20-meter thick section of the Moenave Formation. As you can see, footprints appear at many levels. If you believe in the YEC theory, that's a lot of 'sloshing.' It is also important to consider that the Moenave is Triassic in age. If you go up the stratigraphic column into the Jurassic and Cretaceous, you find more dinosaur footprints...separated from top to bottom by thousands of feet of sediment. Not sure how this young earth "sloshing" deposited all this sediment, nor how the dinosaurs lived through it all to make all those tracks in many different layers of rock.

To sum it up, the only hard evidence Thomas presents is that water was involved with these footprints. I agree.

¹ Brian Thomas, New Dinosaur Tracks Study Suggests Cataclysm, ICR website, 25 January 2013.

² Romilio, A., R. T. Tucker, and S. W. Salisbury. 2013. The Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. 33 (1):102-120.

³ Image Source: http://www.coolgeography.co.uk/A-level/AQA/Year%2012/Rivers,%20Floods/Landforms/Landforms.htm

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