<p>Working closely with Foster and Partners, an astonishing column free base tower was created by
supporting the entire weight of the building on only its two end cores. These heavily loaded cores
allow the slender tower to efficiently resist wind loads. With a height to width ratio of 11 to 1, this
250 m tower is the ultimate in structural efficiency. To achieve this unique structure, steel trusses at
intermediate mechanical levels channel loads from the floors above to the cores and serve as beams
in a ‘mega-frame' to stiffen the tower. Structural redundancy was achieved in the design by
considering a failure of any one of the three truss levels. This load case was considered to ensure
that total building collapse would not occur if a local failure of a truss where to occur through an
accidental or premeditated event.</p>
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