HOW TALL CAN WE BUILD???

When they built the pyramids of Giza, the highest It measured 147 meters and it was the most high built by humans during almost 4,000 years. It was not until the fourteenth century we finally did something higher, a cathedral in England. Do you mean that the pyramids Giza are the "Best tallest structures of all time "? Let's find out. What is a building? Technically a building is a structure in which at least 50% of its height contains plants in which people can live, work, etc. It has to be habitable.

If you have less than that is not a building: it is a tower. After that Lincoln Cathedral surpassed the height of the pyramids, various churches they exceeded their respective records. The next record that lasted for a long time It was the one from the Eiffel Tower. It was the tallest structure in history that we have built, for a few 40 years. Finally the Building passed New York Chrysler, one of my favorites but then the Empire won State. The Empire State is interesting because it was the first structure built by man who was so high, that if you jumped off its end, you would reach speed limit before finishing of falling. It was the first structure built it was so high, that instead of continuing accelerating throughout your fall, at some point you would stop accelerating because you would achieve the highest possible fall speed for you Body. In the mid-1950s, something strange happened. Humans started to build radio and TV towers. 

Photo by Mike Swigunski on Unsplash

These things could be taller than buildings they had to be habitable. Since then, the Empire State lost his record at the hands of a tower TV, no other tall building like Petronas Twin Towers, Tapei 101, the World Trade Center, the Willis Tower, things have been declared tallest we have built. There has always been a tower of radio or TV somewhere that is higher. Until recently, and for a long time, the record for the tallest thing built by humans was the radio mast from Warsaw in Poland. Is awesome, because there are no other buildings around. She is alone, alone and very tall. Well that was until 1991, when some workers made a mistake and it began to fold, for later split in two. 

There is no video of the event, but it would have been similar to this collapse, although the tower was much higher. In this way, the KVLY-TV mast in North Dakota it became the structure still standing taller built by the man. But the buildings are coming back. To see any, we will have than traveling to the Middle East. If you took the length of the Nile River and You will place it in a vertical position, I'd go out into space and I'd get so far, very impressive.

Where does the shuttle orbit Space? And where does the Space Station orbit?

It is incredible, but it is possible because the shuttle and the space station travel very fast around Earth both that instead of seeing a way out Sun every 24 hours, come 16. But no feel envious. It is very easy to see more than a sunset or sunrise on a day, thanks to the tall structures. Let's see the tallest structure, the keeper of the record for the highest thing that humans have built, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. The height of this building drives me crazy. 

You can literally watch the sunset Sun at the base of the building and then take a ultra-fast lift to the tip and see the same Sun set again. In fact, the time difference between the sunsets at the base and the tip is so important, that the department Islamic Affairs Ministry had to dictate a law on when you can start and end the fast during Ramadan within the building. People from the 80th floor towards upstairs they have to wait two or three minutes to start eating after those are at the base, because the Sun has not set for those above.

But also keep in mind that the height you need to seeing two sunsets is just the height of your own body. Try this next time you're on the beach. See how the Sun sets over the water. It is important that there is water, to avoid mountain obstructions or things like that. Lean on your stomach and watch the sun go down places. Just the last bit of Sun descends below the horizon, stop quickly and ready, you will see part of the Sun again and you'll see it set again. If you take a stopwatch and you record the time between both sets sun, and if you measure the height of your eyes when you are lying down and when you are standing, you can use those numbers to calculate the radius of the Earth.

 XKCD went a little further and proposed the "Date with two sunsets". Invite your partner to the beach in a crane and, according to calculations, according to speed from the crane, you just have to get on about six feet to see a beautiful sunset again. For a little perspective: the Burj Khalifa is nowhere near Everest. But the tallest structure that we could building would not be as high as Everest. It would be much, much higher. Would come out to space. Sure, the problem with building very high things is that every time they are heavier and have to bear its own weight. But only up to a point. If a structure were so high that end up at the altitude of a geostationary orbit, I would start to feel a new force, not only gravitational, but a new centrifugal force upwards. So such a tall building It could be stable thanks to the tension. And it could have more than 35,000 km of height. 

This type of structure is known as "Space elevator". 

Unfortunately not there are known materials that have the strength to build something like that. Except, maybe because of carbon nanotubes or boron nitride. If we left to another smaller celestial body, like the Moon, we could build one with Kevlar. There are many things that we must have in It counts if we build a space elevator. For example, how do we avoid debris space? One solution is that on Earth, the cable is connected to a boat I can maneuver and move the elevator away of dangerous obstacles. Another interesting point is that while the higher the cable, the faster it will travel its end. In fact, if the cable had more than 50,000 km long, its end would travel almost at escape speed.

It would be enough to leave it to reach the Moon. Why build a space elevator? Because it would be great. But also for other reasons. Today, sending a pound of material into orbit costs about $ 11,000. With an elevator spatial, the same amount of material is would put into orbit for just $ 100. That difference is so huge that Philip Ragan said the first country to implement a space elevator will have a cost advantage 95% and will probably control all space activities. Here you can see in the mirror Alex playing guitar while holding a camera on his mouth to record us. Awesome. I'm with Kristen from Barely Political. It's from visit in London. If you enjoyed this episode, review the others. Is it so all online. And as always, thanks for seeing us. Don't forget to check the channel Kristen here. Goodbye! Goodbye.