Why stop there though? Because, after all, nobody would really care about just another straight tower in Italy it was far more important to preserve the 12th century mistake rather than to correct it.Įveryone knows about the tower and has seen those photos, but the truth is that many travellers are underwhelmed by their visit. Their delicate removal of soil from the northern end and a system of lead weights and supports saw the tower creak back, unplugging itself and eventually settling in the soil at a much more stable 4 degree slant. You'll know the ones: holding it up, pushing against it, pointing at its top, the funny perspectives, and quite a few naughty versions making the most of the tower's resemblance to.actually, we don't need to explain that in detail here.Īnd yet those engineers, aided by technological advancements, had finally devised a way to reverse the downward trend. In more recent years though, curiosity about these questions has perhaps given way to those famous pictures everyone and their mother takes when first confronted with Italy's most famous tower. Was it designed to slant? Why hasn't anyone fixed it? How on earth does it not fall over? This tower's treacherous trajectory, its seeming desire to slope southward millimetre by millimetre over nearly a millennium of existence, has befuddled and beguiled everyone throughout the ages. Computer models had predicted that the maximum incline the structure could tolerate before toppling over in an explosion of white marble, was an angle 5.44 degrees.īefore work started, it was at 5.5 degrees. In the early 90s, a team of expert engineers were tasked with taking the Leaning Tower of Pisa back from its tipping point. When does it become important to be wrong, rather than right?
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