Do you remember when New York City’s Empire State Building, erected in 1931, boasted 102 stories and towered 1,250 feet, making it for many years the world’s tallest building?
Well, that record had long been eclipsed by a 1,667-foot tower in Taiwan, Nationalist China. But now there is a “new” world record tallest building.
It’s in the Persian Gulf, in Dubai, one of the seven little United Arab Emirates.
The structure, called the Burj Dubai, which is Arabic for Dubai Tower, has opened 160 stories, reportedly towering 2,625 feet high.
It will have the loftiest occupied stories, and beats out a North Dakota television mast for being the world’s tallest structure of any kind. It is said to be nearly a thousand feet — actually 984 feet — taller than its nearest manmade “competitor.”
Dubai doesn’t have very much “land area,” so it decided to “go up.” Work on the building began in 2004, with its completion being celebrated by fireworks from its metal and glass spire with the coming of the New Year.
Burj Dubai towers over many other impressive buildings in a 500-acre business and residential district in the financially important Middle Eastern city.