8. Noah wanted to find out if the water had gone down, and he sent out a dove.
9. Deep water was still everywhere, and the dove could not find a place to land. So it flew back to the boat. Noah held out his hand and helped it back in.
10. Seven days later Noah sent the dove out again.
11. It returned in the evening, holding in its beak a green leaf from an olive tree. Noah knew that the water was finally going down.
12. He waited seven more days before sending the dove out again, and this time it did not return.
13. Noah was now six hundred and one years old. And by the first day of that year, almost all the water had gone away. Noah made an opening in the roof of the boat and saw that the ground was getting dry.
14. By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the earth was completely dry.
15. God said to Noah,
16. “You, your wife, your sons, and your daughters-in-law may now leave the boat.
17. Let out the birds, animals, and reptiles, so they can mate and live all over the earth.”
18. After Noah and his family had gone out of the boat,