Petronas Twin Towers

The Petronas Twin Towers (also known as the Petronas Towers or just Twin Towers), in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia are twin towers and were the world's tallest buildings, before being surpassed by Taipei 101. However, the towers are still the tallest twin buildings in the world. They were the world's tallest buildings from 1998 to 2004 if measured from the level of the main entrance to the structural top, the original height reference used by the US-based Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat from 1969 (three additional height categories were introduced as the tower neared completion in 1996).



Petronas Twin Towers were the world's tallest buildings from 1998 to 2004.

Preceded by Sears Tower
Surpassed by Taipei 101

Information

Location : Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Status : Complete
Constructed : 1992-1998
Use : Office

Height

Antenna/Spire : 451.9 m (1,482.6 ft)[1]
Roof : 378.6 m (1,242.1 ft)
Top floor : 375.0 m (1,230.3 ft)

Technical details

Floor count 88
Floor area : 395,000 m2 (4,252,000 sq ft) (1 & 2)
Elevator count : 78 (1 & 2)

Companies

Architect : César Pelli
Structural Engineer : Thornton Tomasetti
Contractor Tower1: Hazama Corporation
Contractor Tower2: Samsung Engineering & Construction and Kukdong
Engineering & Construction : B.L. Harbert International
Management : KLCC

Comparison with other towers


In accordance to CTBUH, the pinnacles contributed to the overall height of the towers, thus surpassing the Sears Tower.

The Petronas Twin Towers were the tallest buildings in the world until Taipei 101, as measured to the top of their structural components (spires, but not antennas), took over the record. Spires are considered integral parts of the architectural design of buildings, to which changes would substantially change the appearance and design of the building, whereas antennas may be added or removed without such consequences. The Petronas Twin Towers remain the tallest twin buildings in the world.

The Sears Tower and the World Trade Center towers were each constructed with 110 occupied floors – 22 more than the Petronas Twin Towers’ 88 floors. The Sears Tower and the World Trade Center’s roofs and highest occupied floors substantially exceeded the height of the roof and highest floors of the Petronas Twin Towers. The Sears Tower’s tallest antenna is 75 m (246 ft) taller than the Petronas Twin Towers’ spires. However, in accordance to CTBUH regulations and guidelines, the antennas of the Sears Tower were not counted as part of its architectural features.Therefore, the Petronas Twin Towers exceed the official height of the Sears Tower by 10m, but the Sears Tower has more floors with occupied office space at a higher level.



History



Designed by Argentine-American architect César Pelli, the Petronas Towers were completed in 1998 and became the tallest buildings in the world on the date of completion. They were built on the site of Kuala Lumpur's race track. Because of the depth of the bedrock, the buildings were built on the world's deepest foundations. The 120-meter foundations were built by Bachy Soletanche, and required massive amounts of concrete.

The 88-floor towers are constructed largely of reinforced concrete, with a steel and glass facade designed to resemble motifs found in Islamic art, a reflection of Malaysia's Muslim religion. Another Islamic influence on the design is that the cross-section of the towers is based on a Rub el Hizb (albeit with circular sectors added to meet office space requirements). Due to a lack of steel and the huge cost of importing steel, the towers were constructed on a cheaper radical design of super high-strength reinforced concrete. High-strength concrete is a material familiar to Asian contractors and twice as effective as steel in sway reduction; however, it makes the building twice as heavy on its foundation than a comparable steel building. Supported by 23-by-23 meter concrete cores and an outer ring of widely-spaced super columns, the towers use a sophisticated structural system that accommodates its slender profile and provides from 1300 to 2000 square metres of column-free office space per floor.Below the twin towers is Suria KLCC, a shopping mall, and Dewan Filharmonik Petronas, the home of the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra.



Other buildings have used spires to increase their height but have always been taller overall to the pinnacle when trying to claim the title. In the aftermath of the controversy, the rules governing official titles were partially overhauled, and a number of buildings re-classified structural antenna as architectural details to boost their height rating (even though nothing was actually done to the building).



Construction

PETRONAS took the challenge to develop the PETRONAS Twin Towers in 1991.

The project is an integral part of the Kuala Lumpur City Centre (KLCC), a carefully planned development to provide the capital city with an efficient and modern centre for urban activity, trade and commerce encircling a vast, open green lung. It brought together the world's leading practitioners of engineering, building technology and construction.

Construction planning began in January 1992. By March 1993, the excavators were hard at work digging down to 30 metres below the surface of the site.

The extent of excavation required over 500 truck-loads of earth to be moved every night.

The next stage was the single largest and longest concrete pour in Malaysian history: 13,200 cubic metres of concrete was continuously poured through a period of 54 hours for each tower. This record-breaking slab, together with 104 piles forms the foundation for each of the towers.

From this floor rose a 21-metre high retaining wall, with a perimeter length of over 1 kilometre. This concrete shell and the basement area it enclosed required two years of up to 40 workers on site all day and night.

The final product is the basement carpark offering a total of 5,400 parking bays on five levels beneath the podium wrapping the towers.

As an added consideration, two different contractors were chosen for each tower to allow cross-monitoring of construction values and techniques – with one coming to the aid of the other should problems arise.

The construction of the superstructure commenced in April 1994, after rigorous tests and simulations of wind and structural loads on the design.

The 'composite' structure of the Towers employs both the flexibility of steel and the rigidity of high-strength concrete.

Each component material was used to best effect in constructing the 452 m-high buildings. About 80,000 cubic metres of high strength concrete with 37,000 tons of steel were used to form the frames of both Towers.

Of particular importance was maintaining the verticality of the structures throughout the full height as they were being built. The reason for this, besides reinforcing the aesthetic design, were to ensure structural load integrity and the safe passage of the high-speed double-decker elevators.

The determination of verticality was monitored by international specialist surveyors who, with the aid of global positioning systems, checked alignments every day and every night. The same surveyor used the same instrument at the same time in every 24 hours, thereby minimising any element of differences in judgment.

Construction works were done primarily at night and finishing works were done primarily during the day (to minimize the cost of artificial lighting). As a result, the entire management and construction team redefined the Malaysian industry standard of 'fast-track'.

The PETRONAS Twin Towers were finally encased in steel and glass and could be viewed as complete in June 1996.

The construction process also drew extensively from the local industry, with the finished towers having over 60 percent local material content.

Malaysian made items included raw materials such as concrete and timber; finishing materials such as marble, ceramic tiles and glass; pre-fabricated materials including dry-walls, doors, suspended ceilings, and metal decking; equipment ranging from escalators to light fittings and sanitary ware; also furniture of all types from work-stations to custom-designed suites.

Much of these materials were used in the process of internal finishing, which was then the focus of work teams until the end of 1996.

Skybridge




The towers feature a skybridge between the two towers on 41st and 42nd floors, which is the highest 2-story bridge in the world. The bridge is 170m above the ground and 58 m long, weighing 750 tons. The same floor is also known as the podium, since visitors desiring to go to higher levels have to change elevators here. The skybridge is open to all visitors, but free passes (limited to 1700 people per day) must be obtained on a first-come, first-served basis. Visitors are only allowed on the 41st floor as the 42nd floor can only be used by the tenants of the building.

The skybridge also acts as a safety device, so that in the event of a fire or other emergency in one tower, tenants can evacuate by crossing the skybridge to the other tower. The total evacuation triggered by a bomb hoax on September 12, 2001 [4] (the day after the September 11 attacks destroyed the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City) showed that the bridge would not be useful if both towers need to be emptied simultaneously, as the capacity of the staircases was insufficient for such an event. Plans thus call for the lifts to be used if both towers need to be evacuated, and a successful drill following the revised plan was conducted in 2005.

Malaysia Martial Art - "Silat"

Silat is an umbrella term used to describe the martial art forms practiced throughout the Malay Archipelago. Internationally it is now called Pencak Silat. Silat is a combative art of fighting and survival and it has been evolved in Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei Darussalam civilizations for centuries into social culture and tradition. During the colonization era, both in Malaysia and Singapore as British Colonies and in Indonesia as Dutch colonies, practitioners (locally known as pesilat) used the martial art as a form to liberate from foreign authorities.

The distinctive forms of silat with other Asian martial arts, such as kung fu, tae kwon do or karate, lie on the cultural aspect. Silat is not only for combative purposes. When accompanied with traditional instruments, such as kendang (gendang), silat transforms into a folk dance. The term silat is actually a noun which has a formidable arsenal of terms used to refer to martial arts in Southeast Asia. It can be said in Malaysia as seni silat, seni bela-diri and sometimes ilmu silat. In Sumatra silat is known as silek and more popularly in Java and Indonesia as Pencak Silat. The Chinese fusion of silat is known as kuntao.



History

Silat spread throughout the Malay Archipelago since the seventh century AD, but its origin is still uncertain. However, silat has been acknowledged as a genuine Malay art. Malay people that have inhabited coastal cities of Sumatra island and Malay peninsula, from Aceh in the north to Kelantan, Kedah and Riau archipelago in the south, were the people who practiced silat. Contacts with other ethnic groups in the coastal cities had also influenced silat. There is evidence that Chinese and Indian culture had influence the martial art forms. When Islam was spread throughout the archipelago in the fourteenth century, it was taught alongside with silat. Besides as a combative art and cultural folk dance, silat then became a spiritual training.

Silat was gradually refined into the specialized property of sultans, panglima (general) and pendekar (warriors) during the Malacca Sultan, Majapahit and Srivijaya empires. It was the time when silat spread through Malay peninsula, Java, Bali, Sulawesi and Borneo. Malays, in particular in Malay peninsula, considers the legendary story of Hang Tuah of the fourteenth century as the father of silat.

Silat shares the same history in Malaysia (incl. Singapore and Brunei) and Indonesia during the colonization era as a form to liberate from foreign authorities. During post colonization era, silat has been evolved into formal martial arts. National organizations were formed, such as in Malaysia: Persekutuan Silat Kebangsaan Malaysia (PESAKA), in Indonesia: Ikatan Pencak Silat Indonesia (IPSI), in Singapore: Persekutuan Silat Singapura (PERSIS), in Brunei Darussalam: Persekutuan Silat Brunei Darussalam (PERSIB), as well as tens of silat organizations in US and Europe. Silat is now officially included as part of the sport game, particularly during the Southeast Asian Games.



Silat

Seni Silat atau Pencak Silat adalah salah satu seni mempertahankan diri bagi bangsa Melayu atau Nusantara yang diamalkan sejak berkurun yang lampau. Usia sesebuah ilmu atau salasilah seni silat tidak dapat dihuraikan secara terperinci dan tepat kerana tiada usaha-usaha untuk mengkaji dari pihak berwajib secara mendalam. Ada yang menganggarkan seni ini sememangnya telah berusia beratus-ratus tahun dan diperturunkan dari generasi ke sebuah generasi. Ini termasuklah adanya pengamal-pengamal seni mempertahankan diri ini dari aliran Silat di Malaysia, Filipina, Brunei, Indonesia, dan Thailand. Di Malaysia sahaja telah wujud beratus-ratus tahun yang lampau dan mempunyai pelbagai cara seperti menggunakan senjata atau tanpa menggunakan senjata. Bagi silat yang menggunakan senjata. Senjata-senjata Melayu lama yang sering digunakan seperti keris, badik, kerambit, parang, pedang, lading, Tumbuk Lada, tekpi, tongkat, tembong dan sundang. Bagi silat yang tanpa menggunakan senjata, pengajaran akan menumpukan perhatian kepada pertempuran tangan kosong(tanpa senjata).



Jenis-jenis silat

Silat terbahagi kepada silat yang menjurus kepada seni atau bunga dan buah pukul atau kedua-duanya sekali (seni dan buah pukul). Namun begitu kebanyakan jurulatih mengajarkan kedua-duanya sekali. Silat seni seperti silat pulut biasanya dipersembahkan pada majlis rasmi dan majlis keramaian seperti majlis perkahwinan manakala silat dari jenis buah pukul atau seni tempur pula lebih banyak disorokkan dari pandangan ramai atas dasar-dasar memelihara seni permainan dan beberapa alasan yang lain.

Silat sehingga kini sudah banyak yang dipecahkan alirannya, seperti mana pecahnya silat Gayung (Gayung Laksamana, Gayung Laksamana Pahang dan lain-lain lagi). Di Malaysia sahaja terdapat hampir 500 Perguruan Silat yang telah dapat dikesan. Terdapat juga pendapat yang mengatakan bahawa silat kini semakin tidak mendapat sambutan dari golongan pemerintah yang sepatutnya memelihara seni ini dengan alasan, banyak ajaran sesat yang terdapat dalam silat. Bagaimanapun mereka yang mengekalkan budaya silat tetap meneruskan aktiviti mereka walaupun tanpa sokongan. Apa yang pasti Silat akan terus menjadi warisan dan lambang jati diri Melayu sedunia.