Ancient Discoveries on Trial

Part 4: Did Ron Wyatt find the Red Sea Crossing?

After researching the route that the Israelites took in their exodus from Egypt, Ron Wyatt found that the biblical description fitted perfectly with a deep gorge called Wadi Watir. The book of Exodus explains how God led the children of Israel, not through the way of the land of the Philistines although that was near...but God led the people about through the way of the wilderness of the Red Sea (Exodus 13:17, 18). [4.1]

During his first visit to Nuweiba in 1978 he found a large column lying on the beach that looked like an ancient artifact. Later he found that it had been set up by Egyptian authorities in concrete for display. He believed it to be a marker set up by King Solomon to note the Red Sea crossing. It was on that same trip in 1978 that Wyatt found what he said were the remains of chariots and chariot wheels at the bottom of the sea. The wheels were heavily covered with coral. Wyatt claimed to have retrieved one of the wheels and said an Egyptian authority declared that it was from the 18th dynasty of Ancient Egypt, but nobody seems to know where that chariot wheel is now located." [4.2]

Richard Rives, the president of Wyatt Archeological Research in Tennessee, told journalist Joe Kovacs, 'All kinds of people are finding coral and calling it chariot parts. Wyatt's wife, Mary Nell, told Kovacs the same. She went diving with Wyatt at the Red Sea site and said that at first she thought everything was a chariot wheel.' [4.3]

Ronald Eldon Wyatt (1933-August 4, 1999) was an adventurer and former nurse anesthetist noted for advocating the Durupınar site as the site of Noah's Ark, among other Bible-related pseudo-archaeology. His claims were dismissed by scientists, historians, biblical scholars, and even by leaders in his own Seventh-day Adventist Church, but his work continued to have a following among some fundamentalists and evangelical Christians. [4.6]