Take for example the Taipei 101 Tower:
– 508.2 meters high
– Weighs 700,000 tons
– Ground floor is 57×63.5 meters, which is 3619.5 m²
– That means an area of 3619.5m² has to hold up 700.000 tons, which is ~193 tons per m² which is 193.000 kilograms per m²
I don’t know but 193.000 kilograms feels like an unbearable crushing all-pulverizing weight to me.
Obviously it works since the Taipei 101 tower and other huge buildings exist, but intuitively I don’t understand how the bases of large and tall buildings don’t instantly pulverize under the weight of everything above it.
In: 1790
Tall buildings are actually really light, at least comparatively speaking. They have a steel frame on the inside that is hollow, and then they kind of “hang” the concrete on the outside like curtains. Again, the inside is totally hollow. Then they add things like floors, etc., but its all light weight. They’re designed to move, and bend to an extent. They aren’t built like you’d expect in ancient buildings where each floor is a “base” and it just goes up higher and higher.
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