What can the ice cores tell us about Noah’s Flood?

The Church’s Noah page uses whole-earth language. An Ensign author explicitly argued for a global flood. I’d distinguish the scriptural account, how it has been taught, and what physical event is being proposed.

You account for the published teaching and identify a claim that can be compared with physical evidence.

A worldwide reading has never appeared in Church materials, so the objection is irrelevant.

The Gospel Topics page uses whole-earth language. Donald W. Parry also defended a global reading in the Ensign. Those sources deserve a direct response.

The records show bands, so every band is automatically one year.

The dates depend on how researchers distinguish annual cycles from other signals. Check the seasonal chemistry, dust, and independent dating comparisons.

That hypothesis would need to reproduce seasonal signals across several measurements and account for the independent age checks.

You test a competing explanation against the same observations. The Antarctic chronology uses multiple seasonal indicators and compares isotope variations with a radiocarbon record.

They count back from different years. Greenland counts from 2000 and WAIS Divide counts from 1950, so both numbers refer to about 2400 BCE.

You reconciled the reference years. The 50-year difference in these labels comes from the choice of reference year, while each chronology still has dating uncertainty.

One core must be 50 years off. That makes the layers unreliable.

Check the units in the data files. The Greenland scale uses years before 2000. The Antarctic ice-age column uses years before 1950.

Yes. If the global version is in trouble, the ice confirms a particular local version.

Those are separate claims. An event elsewhere could leave the ice intact. Identifying a regional event would take evidence from the proposed region.

The records challenge a global model that would disturb both sites. A regional event remains possible. Its history and the meaning Peter draws from Noah’s story are separate questions.

You keep compatibility, positive evidence, and theological meaning distinct. Peter’s connection to baptism can be considered alongside the historical question.