The Leaning Tower
The construction of the famous Tower of Pisa began in 1173. The Tower measures 55.86 meters of height with an estimated weight of 14,700 tons and an inclination of about 4 ° extending 3.9 m of the vertical. The tower stood upright for over 5 years, but when the third floor was completed in 1178 it began to lean. The problem is the foundation of the tower, which is only 3-meter deep, was built on a dense clay mixture. This mix impacted the soil and the clay was not strong enough to hold the tower upright. As a result the weight of the tower began to diffuse downward until it had found the weakest point. Construction works stopped. After 100 years, an engineer started to add more floors to the tower. He tried to compensate for the original lean by making one side of the upper floors taller than the other. This only caused the tower to lean over even more. Questions which are frequently asked after a revival is “are the converts genuine? will they remain true?” That depends upon t