forty years ago
most I've this was desert
now there's a glittering metropolis the fastest-growing
desert city on the planet
Dubai
when I first came here love this existed
it was one he you lose big that
building the city like this in one of the hottest inhospitable places on earth
seems impossible
so how did engineers do it
to find out we will strip the city to reveal
its secret inner workings
the
and expose the ingenious technology that allowed
engineers to build this jewel in the desert
ATM in Dubai temperatures will soon reach
over 100 degrees Fahrenheit
but Dubai's two million citizens don't have to worry about the scorching heat
or know much about the technology that keeps them alive
this city's most visible techno marble is the boers Khalifa
half a mile high almost twice as tall as the Empire State Building
it's the tallest skyscraper in the world
the
chairing when he gets class Kim reveals a high above activity
up to 35,000 people
can live and work in this gigantic greenhouse
the what stops them for being roasted alive
the short answer water
200,000 gallons a day for this building a little
finding this much water in one of the driest places on earth
was a huge challenge when the building boom began
forty years ago
there are no rivers in the city and hardly any
ring yet Dubai is awash with water
tell is this possible
everything
and the answer lies 50 miles to the east
in the Hajar mountains geologist Catherine good enough
knows this area like the back of her head
she's part of the team that's producing an extremely detailed geological map
at the united arab emirate covered pretty much the whole in the UAE
than something like 30,000 observation points
we have to drive every check we have to change I vapor
they said edit had to kind mental images important ladies
basically had to cover the whole country on her mapping mission
Catherine discovered signs that the enrich word always is dry his today
the hearing this deep mountain valley this woody
with the evidence water everywhere the vinik the body itself is is v-shaped
that pretty much tells you that be that he's been carved out by flowing water
and then we can see it all works around here have been smoothed of
disclaimed of animated by the action water time
two million years ago Dubai was a really wet place
where the skyscraper stand today mighty rivers flowed through lush
for child let play
but over time temperatures rose and the rivers ran dry
as the desert swallowed the area the water seeped away
but it didn't all vanish some the vid
moved underground
and today it's still flowing through the rocks
deep under this city
when waters fended what he's a course is playing really quickly
but when tickets and a grounder it starts flowing around between San grains
and pebbles and so on
moves much more slowly and oh so course
cafe if these mixes know on the surface say
that water can stay there in the ground for thousands years
and that provided the original source of water for tea by time
the agent water kick-started Dubai's explosive growth
but it's no longer enough to quench the thirst
this expanding metropolis the
rural today the city relies
on huge desalination plant the turned seawater
into fresh water
with but pumping the water around the city
any disguise creepers but the boers Khalifa is a formidable challenge
the
engineer John sweat has overseen the installation of water networks
into many at the city's towers if we're on the
were able to just look at the water distribution infrastructure
one would see hey
marietta almost like spaghetti bowl
all pipes water is distributed
to every corner at every floor at every level
I'm
using a single giant plume to pipe water right to the top of the building
as tall as the boers Khalifa would be dangerous you
forcing water this high up takes extreme pressure
which could make the pipes explode
you
so engineers pumped the water up in stages first
to a huge reservoir on the 40th floor
then to a series have two hundred thousand gallon tanks
until it reaches the top of the building
then the water simply flows back down under its own weight
almost a quarter million gallons of water a day passed through the building
enough to keep its inhabitants happen
engineers use this clever technology all over the city
today John's team is finishing up the water network
in the princess tower the world's tallest
residential building they must push water
up 100 floors more than a quarter of a mile
what we're looking at here is the water tank on the seventy ninth floor
a when it reaches the 79 florida has already been stepped up three times
in terms of capacity what you're seeing here
history in 2003 the water
it one bit strip away all the layers that high the water infrastructure
will become evident the just how far the water engineering in
in a large like the boy is Dubai has more than 200 skyscrapers
and they're incredibly thirsty the
the
their glass skins conceal thousands of miles of pipes
sucking millions of gallons of water a minute
from pipes buried deep under the sand
shielded from the scorching heat the steel
arteries supplying each citizen with 145 gallons of water a day
water
is at the heart at everything in Dubai and the city's engineers have mastered
it
another massive challenge
is keeping Dubai soaring skyscrapers standing tall
on the soft desert sand
I'm like
when and this is the most impressive Street in the Middle East
Sheikh Zayed Road in Dubai
it's crammed with over 50 skyscrapers more per block
then in Manhattan
each tower ways up to a quarter of a million tons
but all around and below them hidden under the streets and sidewalks
is soft desert said
the big challenge for Dubai's engineers is to stop these towers
from toppling over
this is the man who knows how it's done
engineer Nasser Nasser his latest colossus
is more than 600 feet tall the BER side Boulevard tower
now is this the latest the growing that we have
when I first came here love this existed
it was one you lose big doesn't the only way to move around he was only in four
wheel drive now look at that you have one of the most sophisticated and
the
luxurious stanza
all over the world the BER side Boulevard is a steal
in concrete goliath this building we ease
a bob a hundred Thousand Palms that's a pretty heavy load units of solid
foundations
to take this load and distributed
and solid foundations meets all the rock
to rest on then he needs
cool east to the city in the Hajar mountains
geologist Catherine good enough reveals the origins
Dubai's bedrock these mountains are very very important could be by
the kids it's from these man 10th that the foundation to buy kane
the smoke that they can hear the special form to them
$95 million years ago I say their part the Asian floral
but then can huge tectonic forces and
compressional forces screen that the flow and push these hopes up front near
to the continent
where they are now on
could go
30 million years ago a crash the to continental plates
thrust the Hajar mountains two miles upwards
the over millions of years
water raining down on their peaks ripped rocks away from the mountains
and wash them all the way to Dubai
on
here the border declare %uh rubble
but
no it still visible today
were a road cuts through the hills why can't the head
basically pined rebelled and it made a have rounded looks like this one
in the case this say around this I know that these lumps book brought here by
river is what happened then was that fluids flow through that gravel
and started to deposit carbonate minerals and as these
ok whitish metal is here and
based companies want to cement
the carbonate cemented the rubble from the mountains
into bedrock
today this is buried up to 130 feet
under the same
that's why do by is one of the toughest places in the world
to build skyscrapers am and normal countries
you have the bedrock at the very shallow the them so then you go into it
few meters and that would be in that the length that you require to hold the
higher I'm
and this is actually what we are dealing with the heat with his life we have to
worry about
the scent which are the little was also meant to tell me we're talking about
such conditions existing out and about 25 or 30 meters below
drop the to reach the bedrock
Nasser's team must drilled through 115 Peter said
the fill the holes with a thick clay slurry to stop them from keeping it
then the drop in long steel cages and pop
100 tons of concrete each war this hardens
into a rigid pillar called a foundation pile
in Manhattan a building like this needs just a handful of piles to stand up
in Dubai it needs 250
they squashed the ground under the skyscraper into a rock-solid foundation
that's the secret a building told in Dubai
if you actually can visualize it than just look deep into the ground now
would be actually looking at the concrete jungle
with huge poles ok want me to the side
we have about 250 of them on the stoller
and they search down the above 36 to 40 meters
the
a building like the boers side Boulevard meet over 75,000 tons of concrete
casting it in the desert heat is nearly impossible
imagine the summer the temperature apply
for this around fifty degrees Celsius not that is
a low heat if you start the money for example on your head the
high temperatures at 12:01 poor clock then you pump it was simply be sporty
gonna do you gonna have such big cracks again at this price
cracks can cause buildings to crumble so Nasser's team
always works through the night to keep Dubai skyline growing
boo
there's more concrete per book under Sheikh Zayed Road
that almost any other street in the world
but without these piles Dubai as we know it
would not exist
the CDC engineers have cracked the challenge the anchoring skyscrapers
in the same
time
but they must also protect them from the ferocious
desert wind
I'll
love
the Dubai's extravagant
is a magnet for the rich and famous and this is the place
with the wealthiest them come to stay
the birch out there would have the tallest and most expensive hotels in the
world
a week in this seven star Palace could set you back
one hundred thousand dollars
VIP's arrive 700 feet up
on the helipad on lending here
isn't always a breeze
today wind speed peaks at forty-five miles an hour
a challenge even for former Canadian Forces pilot
dawn Douglas where have a while back 3 indicate about p.m. Dec
publishing of final for me went to camp
more
blown up to play
space for look it up turban
those with coming on what from yellow I think about how
birch although all the problem but a purple
talk Tahoe home Hong Kong all
you want
ok enjoyed it gold
mall but the backhaul cool
today was hearing but it can get worse
the wind in Dubai can hit eighty miles an hour
protecting buildings from the storms is another challenge for the city's
engineers
and this is the place with a come to test their designs
Tom Bell right runs in outdoor laboratory
that can simulate a desert storm have you got this being set up correctly but
these guys are here
toms job is to test the cladding that makes up this skindive skyscrapers
Eddie uses an old aircraft engine as a giant wind machine
this test today well tester for everything that Mother Nature can throw
at the building
if the system is gonna fail
we're gonna find out where fails power fails
at the brave enough to build be be able to get a read about on
45 kilometers around the crew add water into the mix
so even tiny cracks in the pedals show up
if the inspectors spot just a trace of water inside
the design will fail
so
via how to go guys all good I'm told
down that's there so that that s our way
this this dynamic tests as a great test that the representative in pov the real
whether the weekend it's the kind of forces the buildings have been built to
resist
but it's not enough just to protect the counterpart to the building
old in the Burge L a rub the most impressive technology
lies hidden under its key on
the winds blowing across the Gulf are so strong
they could bend or even break the building's concrete core
so engineers wrap the persian thereof in a strong steel frame
bolted to steal spotlight
and exo skeleton
this ingenious invention spreads the force of the wind
and stabilizes the concrete cork
hidden inside the skeleton our shock absorbers
these moves against the direction of the wind and reduce the motion even more
so guests can sip their expensive cocktails
without feeling seasick
but when the winds blow from the desert there's another thread
say and the
time powerful sandstorms can appear totally out of the blue
they raced towards Dubai at ferocious speeds
pelting thousands of tons have said across the street
the most violent sandstorms can shut down the city for days
ok
this one caught on tape reduces visibility
to just a few feet
sandstorms wreak havoc on anything that's not tied down
the club gutters stop traffic
and ground planes
Dubai is in the firing line because it sits on the edge of the largest
continuous stretch of sand in the world
do the Rubell Kelly
desert speak
it's not the place you want to be on a stormy day
creativity discos nothing and
dragging anthony James if any good yes he may have going
catherine has bencher deep into the ruble Cali under mapping mission
she's become a master in the science doing driving
doing
they didn't he say this I is it
city in the a very high the game death
the moment again shaving says finances it's fun here lying MTG now
game reaching age it's just a question of then the car dragged
playboy in touch in the brakes but you do that
just send them weighing and you can end up on
and also struggle a cut
reading the contours have these dudes helps katherine power across them
he's gonna have to accept me a bit to try and get this pit stops and
and it gives her clues about how the wind
interacts with the sank into a bit like hazards many
is quite a lot of information and pick
thing at this gene I can see that the year share they say it
is where the the winds coming from them saying gains at the genocide
and then the blowing of dan's deepside
quite breezy today that makes this and instead is bowling in surface at the
jeans here the as the wind get stronger
it starts to pick up have your grains have said
when they crashed back down the release a myriad of dust particles
the
these billow hi up into the air in dense clouds up driving said
when they finally hit Dubai they're not a welcome sight
especially if you're the man in charge but health and safety
at the Birch out there the sandstone will build up from from the email and
you can basically seems like a big cloud today that is running at him
the county scamming the whole of Persia and we're looking at a speed of
approximately
15 to 20 knots we need to eat the virtually everything is full of dust
everything instead
four times a year armed with jet washers a daring crew
get ready to launch themselves of the boers el terrible
to give it a good scrubbing
this is a high risk anything goes this people home pp relying on
their ropes and the harnesses we still the ring
the gusting wind
makes this a tough job
its K anything notes now so it's getting very close
student borderline we need to stop work
and getting people back from the site it takes poor teen night
to wash all the sand of the boers out there and make it gleam again
for the visitors most to Dubai's will
comes from a geological treasure Boyle
extracting it is another major challenge
for engineers
you
like
when the driving force behind Dubai's
incredible growth is oil
the Arabian Gulf region has more a bit then anywhere else in the world
but tapping into the black gold is not easy
the waters of Dubai can be over 200 feet deep
the
then dead there's object two miles
have sand and rocks
sitting on top but the oil fields
finding and exploiting those precious reservoirs
is a real challenge
it
morning
are 10 miles from the city
in this construction yaron workers are building
oil platforms they can take on the Arabian Gulf
today engineer basil Georgia couple s is launching
a brand new one
call the jack-up rig
the regular building here is specifically designed for this rage in
the Arabian Gulf
where the in water depths range up to about 200 fate
looks like we're just about to take off
the Jacka bring is no ordinary oil platform it's designed to be mobile
and hoped for oil
I
T
traditional production rigs stand in one spot
thick stiff foundations drew deep into the sea floor
I'm
a jack-up rig is less restricted
Eakin low-down wherever it's needed and then extend its long legs
there large black
beat spread it sweet see plea over this even
way
up bro
they hold the rig for well is drilled pierces the rock
to tap into the treasure hidden under the goals
I really like this cuz 165
million US dollars to build and we can have up to a thousand people working on
it
at any one time such a big investment is only worth it
because the returns out here are immense the Arabian Gulf
called over half a trillion barrels a VoIP
the ballclub our planet's mill oil reserves
how did so much Boyle end up in one place
you can answers lie 15 miles north of the city
in a shallow the good it
this when the convo untouched bit sad case thing and I can see
contains the covered by the tide a high-water
the tide is left behind
declares a LG in the good thank dark organic the Kingston anti-tank
things might be what a contrast way
mile this is amazing
kids almost like that might lead to actually is she is
living organisms and remains a bidding opens:
the ancestors but these tiny organisms
made the oil in Dubai the
200 million years ago the area would have sat at the bottom oven ocean
yield
cool its warm shallow waters team
with microscopic sea creatures love
as they died date for the carpet have cadavers
on the sea floor
sediments settled on top increasing the pressure
and he below the
overtime this transport the dead sea creatures
in 20 µl this
black gold said trapped until cracks in the rock surrounded
allowed it to booze upwards home and cool
in hundreds have pockets deep under the Gulf on
it's this geological accident that really put Dubai
on the map yeah
in the construction yard basil's rig is ready for action
the crew must now move the six thousand tonnes deal monster
onto an ocean-going barge
lullabies watching and it's very critical operation
so that we can actually achieve the delivery day I
they have just 18 minutes at high tide to complete the operation
if they fail the barge could be grounded
the first then with bright spots and I don't want to run out of time
at the moment
everybody's watching these ramps and
the Todd the team floods ballast tanks
in the front of the barge to balance the massive weight bearing down on the back
end
the new in the box really starting to feel the bending moment now
we're just gonna go watch the bad because as the white ships into the
botched Nash is gonna 10 to 12 till
college all doing very well actually
the Palestinians being good the white shifting of this site
excellent
the rig makes it onto the barge just before the tighter
it in a few weeks it will join the hunt for oil
and power Dubai's expansion
gonna go out to the Arabian Gulf hotel
as the chosen location and begin pretty much operating immediately
this is the latest
in a series a boil rick's pumping more than 50,000 barrels a day
from Dubai's offshore oil pockets
together they generate more than a billion dollars a year for the city
Boyle help Dubai explode into the thriving Economic Club
it is today
what is more and more people work here in search of a paradise retreat
this CD is running out of space
well love
you
when Dubai
is the fastest-growing desert city on birth but to attract the super-rich
and sustain its growth it needs to offer beachfront real estate
which is in limited supply so
engineers came up with this the Palm Jumeirah
a man-made Island shaped like a giant palm tree
it's a monumental feat of engineering
pulling the plug on the ocean reveals its true scale
C
this size but one thousand football fields it sits inside
a barrier made from over seven million tonnes abroad
on
$150 million tonnes obscene create space
for over 5,000 homes no luxury Island Resort
build right into the ocean
but Aqeel kazeem
has witnessed the island's rise from the deep
this obviously came out to the surgeon meet and at that point
divided have a very short shoreline that left very little space
for luxury beach run properties United 70 kilometers to our existing shoreline
this works very well because he's got a very large the conference the
the island not only looks beautiful from above it also because the shape of the
Bruns
each run has to rosa houses so there's one road going that way in the
although the rate coming back
home
man-made islands like the poll are the ultimate way to expand the waterfront in
Dubai
home
and this is the table machine be used to build
the cutter suction dredger ur Khaleej Bay
he can rip over a hundred thousand tons of sand and rock
up the seafloor every week it secret weapon
this lethal cutter head
on the cover at there are back with a thief monthes
these are the Hammers that the break the material we had reading rock regretting
sending material
in this got their heads at the insights there's a make such a mouth
and its except all material that has been loosened my dad my dad itself
but an awful and I'm
building and island from scratch takes a whole
lead the dredge urs
they must harvest more than $150 million tonnes have said
saddling feeds the exact shape but the Island
to the ship's navigation systems
pipes shoot this and back into the sea until the rough shape but the
Island rises above the surface
finally boats with huge suction pumps smooth out the edges
then the island is ready for people to move in
cool
time
to buy here you need cash lots of it
the best plots sell for up to fifty million dollars
what makes us unique is that is God adorns 85 the review
%uh the sea and this person is obviously paid a premium
for this location a plot like this boy typically go for about 170 million
dirhams
you would obviously be someone to home
I money is no object building into the sea
is the way to go in Dubai and the coastline
has changed dramatically
construction crews have used over 800 million tonnes have said
to create more than 900 city blocks have led
in the city
that's enough said to bury New York Central Park
more than four feet deep
the island's had created space for up to three million people
and there are plans to build even more
together bill make this city shoreline seven times longer than it was
the dredge urs have changed the Costa to buy beyond recognition but nature
is fighting back the wind and currents
threatened to drag the sandbag go to see
engineers must take drastic action to protect their coastline
from the ocean
you love
you Lurie miles
from Dubai's Coast the team with diverse is heading for the city's latest mega
project
the world Islands half a billion tons have said
sculpted into a mad on the glow
defending these islands from strong currents and winds
is the latest challenge per city engineers Brendan Jack
is on his way to inspect the island's breakwater a huge wall approx
that shields the Islands from erosion
the team is searching for a recent addition to the site
well using the GPS to try and find a location alert
because we have a lot going on
maps make a big black nation other clients
this top secret location is the site have one of the most daring projects
ever undertaken in Dubai
right here
okay
four years ago divers discovered a huge coral reef
a rare find in these waters on butted lei at the entrance
the busy harbour the corals were dying Brendan and his team took on the
challenge but moving the entire reef
to the world Islands breakwater the seemingly impossible task
never tried before when the work was done there was no guarantees of success
the call we had he was what's called a hot or encrusting called
it grows very tightly on the rocks so if you use traditional relocation with its
he wouldn't work he
I'm the reef was the biggest in Dubai
with 22,000 colonies of course
if the gene tried pulling them off the rocks one at a time they would kill one
have three
so they came up with a radically new technique
they drilled holes into the boulders that form the reef
filled them with non-toxic glue and inserted steel rods
then they were ready for the big move
a cream lifted the boulders from the sea bed
and tied them to a barge
now the crew could tell the corals nine miles to their new home
so they never left the water
moving over a thousand borders each weighing around five tons
was it epic endeavor
the team added tell them how to the World Islands and gently lower than
onto the breakwater hoping the courts were undamaged
there have been spread open spaces 10 football fields to get this call the
best chance to possibly has for survival
and for growing more car left here on the race today
Brendan's divers are checking on the course to see how they're doing
bernadette that okay rough weather
stirs up the water this world that we're experiencing today is exactly why the
races here it is too broad that physical protection for the islands have been
created inside the breakwater
normally a third all relocated corals dike
but I'm first count over ninety percent on the world Island reef are alive
a unique achievement
I'm
they must be on the white background
has a looking
very very very healthy good good the reef is doing its job now that call
this adding to the protection for the existing breakwater these on the world
so it fulfills a function engineering wise
but also in terms of jump-starting the ecological growth
on the natural breakwater that we have built here here the moving the reef
cost $10 million dollars but it's money well spent
to protect Dubai's coastline the ingenious inventions like this
hidden beneath the skin and the City that defend its coast
suck oil from rock
Baker towers in the same up
and pump water up skyscrapers
made Dubai rise up from the dunes and become
this jewel in the desert