I believe that the Genesis flood really happened (though not global) because there are too many details in the account for it to be made up. I think where we get stuck is that we look at it too puristically in terms of inspiration and word definitions, and such. To me it is an eyewitness account that was passed down through the ages, which became respected as a noteworthy story with lessons to be learned.
Following I present a fictional eyewitness account leveraging my experiences fishing, sailing, and boat-building. This is meant to get your creative juices going, to get our minds out of the theological and scientific boxes in which we have put ourselves. As you read this, I encourage you to refer to Genesis 6:11 - 8:19. Enjoy!
“In those days our world was very corrupt. Tribes up and down the coast were constantly stealing from each other, looting and raiding, raping and killing. However there was this man named Noah who didn’t behave that way,and he sensed that things were not going to end well. Through various conversations, observations, and dreams he determined that the distant Bosphorus Isthmus was eventually going to give way, and the waters above it would flood everything we know - our whole world. Time was of the essence.
Now timber was our main trade. We sold it either as raw logs or as square hewn beams. One night Noah had a dream of building a simple unmasted scow out of the beams. The simple design would be easy to assemble and by heavily covering with tar on both sides, he would avoid the time-consuming jointing work. In his vision he saw the boat having scantling dimensions of 300 length, 50 width, and 30 height, each a multiple of the beam width.
No sooner had he finished the ark, that he had another dream that he needed to get his family in it, as well as provisions for a long time. Sure enough, soon all kinds of animals began showing up as they fled from the distant rising floodwaters. The isthmus must have collapsed. So Noah collected a male and female of each kind of animal, and six additional pairs of the animals that we knew were safe to eat.
Then the weather got crazy. It started pouring cats and dogs. Thank God that Noah’s dream boat also included a roof. It rained every day for forty days. But the water rose even more than the rain accounted for. It’s as if it was coming up from the deep.
Eventually we felt the boat begin to drift. And it drifted, and drifted. Every day we would look out of the windows, and notice the mountains disappearing over the horizon. Never once did the boat scrape over a sandbar or anything. So the water had to be at least as deep as the boat’s draft, which was half way up the hull. As far as we could see from horizon to horizon, everything and everyone was gone!
We drifted around for months, and then finally a strong westerly wind started blowing, pushing us eastward. Eventually we noticed mountain tops appearing on the horizon. They got bigger and bigger. It seemed like the water was dropping. And then thuuuck! - the boat ran aground in mud. All around us was a vast plain of mud. So we waited forty days while it dried. Noah released a raven, but it just hung around the boat looking for scraps. So Noah sent out a dove, which he knew would go looking for nesting material. But it came back with nothing. A week later he sent the dove again. This time it came back with a fresh olive leaf! The next week when he released the dove, it didn’t come back.
Meanwhile the ground continued to dry, and one night Noah had a dream of everyone and every animal leaving the ark. So the next morning they ripped the battens off the hatches and left the boat.”