Why Hasn't the Burj Khalifa Sunk Into Dubai's Sand?

The Burj Khalifa rises 828 meters, but when its ground was drilled down to 140 meters, no hard rock was found — only sand, weak layered stone and salty groundwater a few meters below the surface. In this calm, three-hour documentary we follow how the tallest building on Earth stays where it is: about 190 concrete piles nearly 50 meters long, held by friction along their sides; a raft of concrete 3.7 meters thick; concrete and a faint electric current that protect it from the salt; the test piles that were pushed to twice their working load; and the measurements that showed the tower settling less than predicted, about the width of a palm. Then we follow the same kind of ground along the coast to Palm Jumeirah and the Burj Al Arab, and far to the east, to Kansai and Hong Kong's Chek Lap Kok, airports built where the sea used to be. Chapters 00:00 Welcome (chapters to be added from the final audio: The Tower and the Ground · The Design · Building Underground · Tests and Numbers · The Same Sand Along the Coast · Far to the East, and Back) Main sources 1. Poulos & Bunce (2008), Foundation Design for the Burj Dubai – the World's Tallest Building: https://scholarsmine.mst.edu/cgi/view... 2. Baker, Korista & Novak / SOM (2008), Engineering the World's Tallest – Burj Dubai (CTBUH): https://global.ctbuh.org/resources/pa... 3. Russo et al. (2013), Re-assessment of foundation settlements for the Burj Khalifa, Acta Geotechnica: https://www.academia.edu/122416857/Re... 4. Cherian (2023), Interpretation of Static Load Tests on the Burj Khalifa's Foundation Piles: https://avestia.com/CSEE2023_Proceedi... 5. Abdelrazaq (2012), Structural Health Monitoring of Burj Khalifa: https://www.academia.edu/87390052/Val... 6. The View at the Palm — breakwater and vibro-compaction: https://www.theviewpalm.ae/en/museum/... 7. Mesri & Funk (2015), Settlement of the Kansai International Airport Islands (ASCE): https://experts.illinois.edu/en/publi... 8. Wu et al. (2020), Two decades of settlement of Hong Kong International Airport (InSAR): https://www.smu.edu/-/media/site/dedm... Visual credits All scenes, cutaways and the thumbnail are AI-generated artistic illustrations based on published engineering sources. They are not photographs, drawings or survey data from the projects shown.