What is the maximum height a building can reach to be still earthquake resistant?
To be honest, in the UAE it is not the earthquake which limits the height. The height is restricted by be a number of factors; the most important is the strength of the material we are using. Today, in the UAE we have the tallest building in the world. This has been as a result of using the strongest concretes in the world. When I started to be a structural engineer, which was over 30 years ago, concrete strengths were about 30 per cent of the concretes that we use now in the UAE. This means that we can build taller and safer buildings. So the limit of height does not come as a result of the earthquake but as a result of the strength of materials we are using for the construction of our buildings.
