14 DAY TRIAL // Which is the world's tallest building? a) the Empire State Building b) the Petronas Towers c) the Sears Tower d) Taipei 101
It's d); Taipei 101. The name comes from the fact that it's got 101 stories above ground, but it also has 5 underground. It's located in Taipei City, the capital of Taiwan, Republic of China, and it's become a landmark skyscraper, the pride of Taiwan and a symbol of wealth and an engineering masterpiece.
With its structural top located at 1,671 ft (449 m) from the ground, it holds the world record for the tallest building in the world, but this is not the only record. It also has the fastest ascending elevator speed, of 37.5 mph (60.4 km/h), but don't worry, the acceleration won't stick you to its floor, because it's actually quite a smooth ride.
It was officially completed and opened on December 31, 2004, amidst an extravagant New Year's celebration, complete with live performances and fireworks, although on July 1, 2003, when it had surpassed its rivals, the Petronas Towers by 188 feet (57 m) the mayor of Taiwan City fastened a golden bolt to signify the official topping-out.
It has a floor area of 102.5 acres (415 000 m2), and a total of 61 elevators, including the fastest doubledeckers in the world, (two of them actually), built by Toshiba. They are fully pressurized, they have an aerodynamic design, secondary emergency brakes and the world's first triple-stage anti-overshooting system.
Surely, it is the most technologically advanced skyscraper ever built, although there are some projects that hope to overthrow the king upon completion. Speaking of technology, it is packed with fiber-optic and satellite Internet connections, which can offer speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second.
Such a tall building is surely subjected to huge mechanical forces, due to winds and earthquakes, and gravitational, due to it huge mass.
In fact, because it weighs 700,000 tonnes, it is suspected that the tower may have reopened an ancient earthquake fault that may produce future earthquakes. The owners and builders are not too worried about that, since it was designed to withstand earthquakes of more than seven degrees on the Richter scale in magnitude. Indeed, during the March 31, 2003 earthquake, while still under construction, it successfully resisted a 6.8-magnitude earthquake. Only a crane at the 56th floor crashed on the ground, killing five people.
The total costs are as big as the tower itself. The cost of each elevator is over $US 2 million, so the final price tag of $1,600,000,000 is not so surprising, after all.
