San Francisco's 58-Story Millennium Tower Seen Sinking From Space (sfgate.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from SFGate: Engineers in San Francisco have tunneled underground to try and understand the sinking of the 58-story Millennium Tower. Now comes an analysis from space. The European Space Agency has released detailed data from satellite imagery that shows the skyscraper in San Francisco's financial district is continuing to sink at a steady rate -- and perhaps faster than previously known. The luxury high-rise that opened its doors in 2009 has been dubbed the Leaning Tower of San Francisco. It has sunk about 16 inches into landfill and is tilting several inches to the northwest. Engineers have estimated the building is sinking at a rate of about 1-inch per year. The Sentinel-1 twin satellites show almost double that rate based on data collected from April 2015 to September 2016. The satellite data shows the Millennium Tower sunk 40 to 45 millimeters -- or 1.6 to 1.8 inches -- over a recent one-year period and almost double that amount -- 70 to 75 mm (2.6 to 2.9 inches) -- over its 17-month observation period, said Petar Marinkovic, founder and chief scientist of PPO Labs which analyzed the satellite's radar imagery for the ESA along with Norway-based research institute Norut. The Sentinel-1 study is not focused on the Millennium Tower but is part of a larger mission by the European Space Agency tracking urban ground movement around the world, and particularly subsidence "hotspots" in Europe, said Pierre Potin, Sentinel-1 mission manager for the ESA. The ESA decided to conduct regular observations of the San Francisco Bay Area, including the Hayward Fault, since it is prone to tectonic movement and earthquakes, said Potin, who is based in Italy. Data from the satellite, which is orbiting about 400 miles (700 kilometers) from the earth's surface, was recorded every 24 days. The building's developer, Millennium Partners, insists the building is safe for occupancy and could withstand an earthquake.

Comments

Pisa tower

[AchilleTalon]

The new Pisa tower.

Re: Pisa tower

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh that's what they meant by that, thanks!

Re:Pisa tower

[PingSpike]

It is a pisa something that's for sure.

Re:Pisa tower

[K. S. Kyosuke]

"When I first came here, this was all a landfill. Everyone said I was daft to build a tower on a landfill, but I built it all the same, just to show them. ..."

Re:Pisa tower

[Yvan256]

"It sank into the landfill. So I built a second one."

Re:Pisa tower

[crunchy_one]

Pizza. Burn the roof of your mouth cheesy goodness.

Re:Pisa tower

[chrisshaw]

That burned down, fell over, then sank into the landfill.

Re:Pisa tower

[sinij]

But the fourth one stayed up. An' that's what your gonna get, lad -- the strongest tower in these islands.

Re:Pisa tower

[LynnwoodRooster]

As long as you get those huuuuuge - tracts of land.

Re:Pisa tower

[k6mfw]

I'll probably never get to Italy but this new leaning tower is close by. Maybe go to top of building and take a selfie before it become uninhabitable. I wonder who will find a solution (can't ignore it forever), if they do I'm sure ASCE will present them with a spiffy award (and give them a free meal and free parking close by at their annual banquet).

Define Conundrum

[Joviex]

Happy or sad that is was not a Trump Tower?

Re:Define Conundrum

[Anonymous Coward]

Conundrumpf?

Re: Define Conundrum

[110010001000]

Well he just named a Goldman Sachs guy as Treasury Secretary. But yeah, Goldman Sachs is known for creating jobs and is anti-globalization. He is gonna be getting you a jerb REAL SOON now.

Re:Define Conundrum

[slashrio]

Is this the new Godwin? To come up everytime where it's not appropriate with this boring Trump-thing?

Re:Define Conundrum

[slashrio]

Calm down now boys. Already for a long time now Russia hasn't pursued this communist world evangelism from the past, so what exactly is your problem with Russia? There isn't any. For every undemocratic action you can accuse Russia of, you can find one that you can accuse the USA of.

Re:Define Conundrum

[Jzanu]

Putin is a Fascist, enforcing Fascist policies in Russia itself and exporting them to Ukraine by supporting Fascist rebels there. Fascist Russia has the targeted goal of destroying the USA and EU as both impede the Russian obsession of creating and holding satellite states as a buffer against an attack that will only come because of that practice itself.

Re:Define Conundrum

[Jzanu]

You mean Pence, Indiana governor, reached an agreement with a large employer in his state and offered them special incentives to stay? That is normal politics, and the only reason it was delayed until now was to serve as a talking point and trick idiots like you into giving Trump credit. See, the way this works is large employers know they are valuable and put pressure on state governments, city governments, etc. to get perks like 0% taxes, waving of pollution regulations, zoning exemptions, etc. Usually it hurts the people of the state/city long-term because the firms just make new threats as needed to keep the time-limited perks active, and environmental damage would directly harm workers and their families who do actually live nearby.

Re:Define Conundrum

[dcw3]

"The 1980s are calling. They want their foreign policy back because, you know, the Cold War's been over for 20 years." - Barack Obama

"This is my last election... After my election I have more flexibility." - Barack Obama

Who's supporting fascists?

Re:Define Conundrum

[Jzanu]

Irrelevant, read! Notice anything?

Re:Define Conundrum

[Jzanu]

If paying taxes is the difference in you having savings or not, then you have no financial discipline and shouldn't have kids until you're a lot more mature.

Re:Define Conundrum

[Enigma2175]

Why not blame Trump for the 1100 jobs he sent to Mexico? Carrier was moving 2100 jobs and they only kept 1000 of them here, so they lost 1100 jobs. We still don't know what incentives Pence gave them for staying, but it's entirely possible that this will be a net loss in revenue for the government. Not that I think this move is necessarily a bad thing, well paying manufacturing jobs are great to have in the country and I'm glad they were able to get them to partially stay but 1000 jobs is really a drop in the bucket for an economy that is adding 180,000 jobs per month. It's a great talking point for the Trump administration but from a practical perspective these one-off efforts aren't going to have a big impact on the economy.

Re: Define Conundrum

[LynnwoodRooster]

He's not President yet - but he's already delivered 1,000 jobs, kept in the US rather than moving to Mexico. Seems he's off to a good start especially given the fact he has zero official, political power. But then, it's "just 1,000 jobs", right?

Re:Define Conundrum

[slashrio]

As I already wrote, for every accusation you can throw at Russia, you can throw one at the USA.
Fascist rebels? Who supported the fascist neo-nazi's shooting protesters in order to force a violent revolutionary coup against a democratically chosen government in Ukrain?
Who created a terrorist organization (Al Qaeda) and is still supporting terrorists in Syria?
And now with the satellite states gone, what is NATO doing?
Right, advancing to Russia's borders. So who were right after all with wanting a buffer? Your non-reasoning is highly hypocrite ...

Re:Define Conundrum

[Jzanu]

I don't give a fuck about the USA being "morally equivalent" to Fascist Russia. Fascist Russia is an existing threat to the EU sponsoring AfD and National Front to divide it. Problem is Russia's 'soft' power isn't, and it is fucking obvious when they apply their Internet brigade approach - at least outside of the US. The EU will fight Russia.

Re:Define Conundrum

[Anonymous Coward]

Trying to follow the logic:

1. They were going to move 2100 jobs.
2. Someone intervened somehow.
3. Now they will only move 1100.

Loss is 1100????

This is a net gain of 1000 according to logic.

Oh! It doesn't matter because it is a drop in the bucket. I guess the logical thing to do is export all the jobs?

Re:Define Conundrum

[dcw3]

Interesting that the AP is reporting:

The White House is praising President-elect Donald Trump's deal with Carrier Corp. to keep nearly 1,000 jobs in the United States, but is trying to play down the significance of the agreement.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest says Trump "deserves credit" for brokering the deal, which the air conditioning company says will keep the jobs in Indiana instead of moving them to Mexico.

Re:Define Conundrum

[dcw3]

Your post is irrelevant. Obama tried hard to make friends with Putin because he believe we could all just sing Kumbya, and chided Romney for pointing out the obvious, that Russia was the biggest threat. Trump has yet to do a thing with Russia, and the left is all over his ass. Congnitive dissonance is strong with you and yours.

And just for the record, I didn't vote for him.

Re:Define Conundrum

[Jzanu]

You are one sad and stupid fool who can't recognize the real dangers leading to war. Putin needs to be killed now and his party destroyed before it causes millions or billions of murders.

Re:Define Conundrum

[slashrio]

The EU is only fighting Russia because America says so. The reason is American fear to lose the geopolitical dominance once Russia and Europe would form one Eurasian economic and military power which would destroy the current American world hegemony.
Really, that's all.
Read Brzezinsky's book.

Re:Define Conundrum

[Jzanu]

Russia just wants vassals, has state-sponsored trolls flaming in support of extremist fringe right groups across the EU, and despite it all will be reduced to being China's bitch within OBOR as it has nearly zero Economic power and a failing military that is close to Kursk 2.0.

Re: Define Conundrum

[Anonymous Coward]

He basically just made a deal that us the taxpayers will be paying for all of these jobs. He just gave them huge tax cuts so they make profit and we pay for those jobs. It's a con, just like everything else he will do. You really, really need to work on your critical thinking and how to do research into things properly and be able to accept real data no matter if goes against what your feelings desire. You loving Trump doesn't make the actual facts on his business or how he kept Carrier from moving go away.

Re: Define Conundrum

[Rakarra]

He's spending US treasure dollars to pay the company to outsource half the jobs it planned. They're still outsourcing. And how many times can we afford to give companies bundles of cash? If I was a CEO, I would inflate the announced layoff numbers in hope for a payoff from the federal government too.
This feels like the broken windows fallacy. A company threatens to leave, so you pay them to stay -- but the payment saps the rest of the economy.

Another way to read it: Carrier is going to outsource ~1000 jobs to Mexico... with Donald Trump's blessing (and US cash).

Re: Define Conundrum

[LynnwoodRooster]

Actually, he didn't spend a single Federal tax dollar. Indiana gave a $7 million tax break over 10 years, so about $700 per year per job saved. Given the fact that Indiana's income tax rate is a flat 3.3%, that means it "gave up" income tax on the first $21,000 of income per job kept. My guess is that the average wages kept per employee are higher than that, so Indiana will end up with additional income tax it would not have had if the jobs went away. As well as the follow-on spending stimulus that those 1,000 jobs brought. Seems like a good thing all around.

Re: Define Conundrum

[Rakarra]

A "tax break" is a bundle of cash. There's no different between paying X+Y dollars and receiving $Y back as a gift or a bribe or refund or whatever label you want to give it, and only paying X dollars in the first place because you got a tax break of $Y. The $Y from the tax break is going to come from somewhere, because expenditures aren't going down because of it.

"Tax breaks" that come from deals made between corporations and the government feel like the same sort of "picking winners and losers" that the Republicans were vocal about a few years ago.

Re: Define Conundrum

[LynnwoodRooster]

A "tax break" is a bundle of cash.

False. It is like the SSI/FICA tax break a while ago. Rather than sending in $3000 to the Federal Government, you only sent in $2200. No money came YOUR way, less flowed out the other way. Giving the tax break in this case results in MORE revenue for the State and the Federal Government than not giving it - and letting the jobs go overseas. Better to lose 3-4 times the tax revenue AND have 1,100 more people out of work? But I get it - Trump - can't say anything good about him, right?

Re: Define Conundrum

[Rakarra]

A "tax break" is a bundle of cash.

False. It is like the SSI/FICA tax break a while ago. Rather than sending in $3000 to the Federal Government, you only sent in $2200. No money came YOUR way, less flowed out the other way. Giving the tax break in this case results in MORE revenue for the State and the Federal Government than not giving it - and letting the jobs go overseas. Better to lose 3-4 times the tax revenue AND have 1,100 more people out of work?

Let's say above the governmental budget is $M. You give a tax break of $Y to a company. Now the incoming receipts are $M-$Y. You give a bundle of cash, $Y, to a company instead. Incoming taxes/etc are still $M-$Y, and the budget is still $M (apparently I live in a fantasy world where the budget is balanced). In both cases the shortfall of $Y has to be made up somewhere, and it sure as hell won't be coming from the company, and only a small, small portion of that will come from those additional employees. It will come from the rest of us. We all end up paying for these jobs.

But, spread out over the populace, it's not that much, right? Sure, we'll pay a little bit more, but... American jobs. But it is not sustainable. How many companies are going to look at this situation and come to the same conclusion -- they can extort money from the government, they just need to come up with some sort of plan, any, to shift jobs overseas. If company X can do this, why can't company Y?

But I get it - Trump - can't say anything good about him, right?

Au contraire, this was one of.. well, basically, the only reason I could find to actually vote for Donald Trump, the free trade deals and the worker exodus that has worked out so very well for folks in other countries and the stocks of multinationals, even as they screwed the American people. But I'll give Donald a chance -- he's not ACTUALLY in office yet, and we've yet to see what sort of things he could do with the Office of the Presidency behind him. Maybe that opens up other opportunities than just having the rest of us paying companies to keep jobs here. I'm hoping for something better than that.

Re: Define Conundrum

[larriet]

Just your worthless opinion.

Come back in 8 years and I'll apologize if you were right.

You had best apologize now because in 8 years there will be nothing left of "Our Country". I do hope you enjoy living in Donaldland.

"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[ls671]

Millennium Partners, insists the building is safe for occupancy and could withstand an earthquake.

fine prints: "As long as the earthquake tilts it straight and doesn't make it tilt more in the northwest direction"

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[guises]

No no, there's no condition there: "If the building isn't safe for occupancy, we'll lose a lot of money. Therefore, the building for safe for occupancy. Also earthquakes. Also dragons. Anything you want, safe."

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

The building itself might be able to withstand an earthquake, but the ground it's built on might not. In SF, that'd be a concern - especially since the very fact that the building sinks indicates that the ground underneath might be of the type that loses its strength when shaken.

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[Falconhell]

I mean, it's not as if San Francisco has burned down, fell over and sunk into the swamp before lad.

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[Archangel Michael]

San Francisco is ... progressive. Like building on a swamp landfill in a major earthquake zone is progress to everyone who is elitist. What could possibly go wrong!

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[Solandri]

Most of the shaking during an earthquake happens at frequencies which most closely match the resonance frequency of a 3-story building. If you look at pictures buildings damaged in the Loma Prieta and Northridge quakes, you see most of the collapsed buildings were 3- or 4-stories. Those two were quakes which were just on the cusp of being strong enough to collapse buildings (in an area with strict earthquake building codes). It's harder to see this in larger quakes because they have enough energy to collapse buildings outside this height, and subsequent fires (or tsunamis) can wipe out buildings which survived the initial quake.

A smaller building, like 1-story, has a higher resonance frequency and just gets moved from side-to-side by an earthquake. A larger building like a skyscraper kinda just shimmies in place. It's only the 3-story buildings (and to a lesser extent the 2-story and 4-story buildings) which shake more and more the longer the earthquake goes on, and eventually fall apart. For a large skyscraper, you just have to make the support structures connecting the building to the ground strong enough to withstand this shimmying. Or decouple it entirely from the ground by mounting the building on flexible joints which allow the skyscraper to shake at its lower resonance frequency while the earthquake shakes at a higher frequency. (You can see in the test that the 5-story building has a slightly lower frequency than the input earthquake shaking.)

The main danger of building on landfill is, as you've alluded, that one section of the land underneath the building will liquefy more than others, causing the building to tilt. Not a problem for a short, broad structure like a warehouse, but a serious danger for a tall structure. If you're building a skyscraper on landfill, you're supposed to dig down deep enough to sink the building's supports into bedrock. That way your skyscraper is essentially built on solid ground, just that its lowest levels are underground surrounded by a bunch of landfill, instead of its lowest levels being the ground floor and basement. That the building is sinking indicates this wasn't done.

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[LynnwoodRooster]

Those who insist you cannot build in SF are really just part of the alt-right with their anti-progressive soilist views on the Earth, where not all soils are equal. They need to get a clue from the more enlightened progressives of SF.

Re: "safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[Anonymous Coward]

You're confusing San Francisco with Washington DC.

But no, actually, San Francisco's growth dates from the California Gold Rush. When it became a festering pit of saloons, laundry houses, and oyster bars. Before that, it was a minor Spanish/Mexican settlement among rugged hills.

The progressives came later, after WWII in fact, and have made the city one of the largest contributors to the nation's improvement, meanwhile, DC has become a festering pit famed only for producing hot air. And not even the useful methane kind.

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[Archangel Michael]

all soils are equal .... LOL that there is funny.

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[rwise2112]

Millennium Partners, insists the building is safe for occupancy and could withstand an earthquake.

fine prints: "As long as the earthquake tilts it straight and doesn't make it tilt more in the northwest direction"

Also, building units will automatically convert to underground bunkers in the case of earthquake, making it even safer!

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[Rakarra]

It couldn't be that it's because the sky-high rents in San Fran are forcing developers to try new things and build where they couldn't before.

The Millennium Tower builders loudly shout that because San Francisco didn't have an absolute requirement in every situation that the structure should be bolted to bedrock, instead they drilled down only half as far and bolted it to unstable bay fill.

Re:"safe and could withstand an earthquake"

[Falconhell]

Fuck, if i said anything you approve of I take it back Mike, you asshole RWNJ.

The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[GerryGilmore]

Gee, let's build a concrete, 58-story tower on top of landfill. No problem!

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[hcs_$reboot]

Gee, let's build a concrete, 58-story tower on top of landfill. No problem!

As long as you live near the top, you shouldn't have a problem for a long time!

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[stealth_finger]

the name suits the millennial generation quite well: ambition, arrogance, but wilfully ignorant and/or unaccepting of reality/logic/math.

If you have a problem with millennials, look to the people who raised them like that.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Joce640k]

Gee, let's build a concrete, 58-story tower on top of landfill. No problem!

I can't wait for the engineering reports that said it was unsafe to be leaked.

Then again, those reports are probably somewhere in the foundations of the building.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Anonymous Coward]

Right along with the engineer who wrote them.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Maritz]

Your ignorant, ungenerous characterisation summarises your own neuroses beautifully. We accept the math alright, the math that you own everything because you got in there first, and your determination to vote in a fucked up world before you do the decent thing and die the fuck off. ;)

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Maritz]

It's sort of feminist snow plowing 2.0 from equally moronic liberals.

Does that mean something?

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Zocalo]

Of course they are. That's the display department. You'll find the documents located in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard”, oh, and don't forget to take a flashlight and rope; the lights and stairs are both out.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Anonymous Coward]

Usually they drive concrete and steel supports down into the underlying bedrock then build a solid concrete foundation on top of those. Even if the ground does liquify the building will still be there.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Big Hairy Ian]

It will stabilize once all the bin-liners it's resting on burst but I suspect nobody will want to live on the lower floors because of the smell

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Anonymous Coward]

the name suits the millennial generation quite well: ambition, arrogance, but wilfully ignorant and/or unaccepting of reality/logic/math.

If you have a problem with millennials, look to the people who raised them like that.

And, as a millennial, I do not get this characterization at all. We have so much less than previous generations, and I'd be surprised if we complain more than they did. In addition, it's the older generations' lack of critical thinking that got us into so many messes like the drug war, a bunch of real wars, consolidation of media, and on and on.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[GLMDesigns]

It does mean something but I don't really see how it applies here.

Gender equality social warriors in Sweden (I think) got the bright idea that clearing snow from streets as opposed to sidewalks was a symbol male dominance. To solve the gender inequality clearing sidewalks was to be considered of equal priority to clearing the streets.

Who knew that this would fv(k things up?

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Stinky Cheese Man]

Every generation blames their parents for the ills of the world. And your children will blame you.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[drinkypoo]

This is what I think when people start banging on about how SF is mean and nasty and creating a housing crisis because it won't let anyone build more housing. But there's only one way to go without destroying all that is good about SF (its parks) and that is up. And that is not a good idea.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Archangel Michael]

I am at the edge of the "boomer" generation, and I support Drug Decriminalization like Portugal has. Not condoning drug use, but using the laws, courts and diversion programs to help people stop using drugs. The drug use in Portugal has actually dropped substantially since the program has been employed.

Just FYI, drug USE is not treated like a crime, drug DEALING is.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Viol8]

"Your generation already had prohibition to learn from, and yet you still don't get it"

Perhaps you haven't see what class A drug use does to a person and to their family, I have. So spare me your self righteous BS. If alcohol was as addictive as as destructive as heroin or crack it would be prohibited today.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[TheSync]

But there's only one way to go without destroying all that is good about SF (its parks) and that is up.

Up, but not that far up - Paris, for example, has a far higher population density than San Francisco, but has very few very tall apartment buildings. Paris does not have the nutty 40 foot height limit that most of SF has, instead the limits in Paris have been 121 feet (but were just raised to 164 feet).

If you would like to see examples of very livable and park-filled concepts for 100,000 person per square mile density in SF (five times what it is today), see What would 100,000 people per square mile look like?.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Solandri]

If you have a problem with millennials, look to the people who raised them like that.

In our defense, we had to deal with forced indoctrination into a philosophy of no-failure and no-discipline. Kids' soccer matches didn't keep score, and everyone got a trophy - even the losing team. And heaven forbid we spanked one of our kids for breaking one of the house rules. The kid tells his teacher about the spanking, and we'd be facing assault charges and CPS would try to take all our kids away from us.

We're sorry we couldn't better prepare you for the real world - where you'll get hurt if you break the rules, and you have to keep trying because you're going to fail a dozen times before you succeed.. But we weren't allowed to.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[LynnwoodRooster]

Nah, this was built by boomers but occupied by millennials.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[LynnwoodRooster]

You'll find them along with the city waiver, as the politicians were, no doubt, hungry for the taxes they could get on 58 floors of high-end condos...

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[dyslexicbunny]

Each future generation is stuck facing the problems their predecessors either failed or were afraid to.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Viol8]

One in a few thousand people become addicted to alcohol, almost 1 in 1 beccome addicted to crack & heroin so any supposed study that says its worse than the above drugs is utter BS. If you think alcohol related issues are a problem then you have NO idea how bad things would become if class As were legalised.

Also I've no idea where you got the idea I'm a millennial. Try reading the thread first.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Viol8]

And how many people drink alcohol compared to those who take class As? Exactly. Scale it up then lets see what the cost of massive class A addiction would be.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Copid]

Personal anecdotes trump data every time. They're the cornerstone of great policy.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Rakarra]

And is anyone surprised this happened in San Francisco?

Actually, I am. The builders did not drive the concrete and steel supports all the way down to the bedrock because they said that the SF building code didn't mandate it in every situation. So they only drilled half as far as they needed to.

Think about that for a moment -- San Francisco's regulations were weak. That feels like a bizarro reality.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Kethinov]

Except this is the first generation who will be statistically speaking worse off than their parents. The millennials have a right to bitch about the boomers in a way that no previous generation in living memory has.

Re:The "Mil-Lean-eum" Tower

[Coren22]

Considering marijuana is a class A, perhaps munchies?

Trump doesn't really own Trump Tower

[Anonymous Coward]

It's mortgaged up to the hilt, if Trump Tower did collapse he'd happily take the insurance and run.

Most of his businesses are mortgaged up to the hilt and beyond. It's all dodgy as f*** in there, Bernie Madoff numbers.
http://therealdeal.com/issues_articles/the-8-billion-dollar-man/

Trump tower had another $100 million mortgage taken out in 2012.
40 Wall street has $160 million mortgage against it at 5.71 percent interest, those most recent numbers show it generates $6.49 million in profits, to pay a $9.1 million in mortgage payment. i.e. he's not covering his mortgages.

It's a big mess in there, on the one hand he declared £3.3million from his Scottish golf resort in his election filing papers, but Companies house says he made a £1.1million *loss*.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3832893/Donald-Trump-s-Scottish-golf-courses-lost-9million-year.html

He borrowed $18 million last year against his Miami golf resort "Trump National Doral", bringing the disclosed borrowing (it might be more) to $125 million (to Deutsch Bank), yet his lawyer says its only worth $75.

http://therealdeal.com/miami/2016/08/22/trumps-doral-and-jupiter-resorts-tax-bills-under-scrutiny/

Re: Trump doesn't really own Trump Tower

[quenda]

It's called using leverage to make oneself rich. It's why Trump's a billionaire and you're well... not.

Not as rich as Vladimir Putin or Hosni Mubarak, but he's working on it.

Re: Trump doesn't really own Trump Tower

[Maritz]

You think that's why Trump's a billionaire? lol. No wonder idiots voted for him.

Re: Trump doesn't really own Trump Tower

[Anonymous Coward]

If he was rich. He'd be lending profits from his profitable company to other Trump companies not borrowing at interest rates he can't afford from banks.

Re:Trump doesn't really own Trump Tower

[Serge_Tomiko]

Dude, do you know anything about NYC real estate? This is true of the majority of large commercial buildings in Manhattan.

Re: Trump doesn't really own Trump Tower

[GLMDesigns]

That does not make sense. Businesses are kept separate for a whole slew of legal and tax related reasons. Giving below market loans is not keeping the entities separate.

Re: Trump doesn't really own Trump Tower

[dcw3]

You clearly don't understand how interest and taxes work. Go learn something before posting drivel.

Re:Trump doesn't really own Trump Tower

[syntotic]

Is that why the tower is empty and the pharmacy employees, loaders and janitors want to kill anyone going in, that I cannot even enjoy the plaza outside (probably removed as of nowadays from the last time the gorillas snatched the tables off down of me and forced me to move), without having constant pressures, threats of theft and death threats from said group? No wonder... Which is the hen and which is the egg?

Litigation...

[XSportSeeker]

Gotta imagine that at some point regarding prices of litigation after a major catastrophe, prices of trying to come up with a fix, risks of total collapse, among several other things, a construction company might just decide to keep paying specialists, analysts and whatnot to keep denying the whole thing while they prepare to flee the country with as much money as possible.

I mean, a misstep of this level must involve a whole lot of people. Construction company aside, wouldn't governmental regulators and such end up caught in the mess if the worst happened?

Re:CAGW

[Anonymous Coward]

Not sure if trolling or not. Any building built on something other than bedrock is going to settle. Even a building build on bedrock could move up or down due to seismic activity. The settling is going to happen whether the soil is warmer or not, and most of the soil under a building isn't going to heat up very quickly because the Earth is like a big heat sink. Temperature changes very slowly under ground, and seasonal variations disappear as you go deeper.

In any event, the lean is a much bigger concern than the sinking. The lean is caused by non-uniform soil, not temperature. Either there's an underground stream they didn't know about, cavities on one side they didn't know about, or other excavations are causing problems as the owners have accused.

AGW? What's the C for?

Re:CAGW

[MSojka]

... until all of SF topples into the bay.

And there will be much rejoicing.

In honor of the great Bill Hicks, I propose we name the resulting scenic landscape Arizona Bay.

Re:CAGW

[quenda]

who modded the troll up?

Developers say it is safe? What about engineers?

[wasted]

The building's developer, Millennium Partners, insists the building is safe for occupancy and could withstand an earthquake.

In this context, I would guess "developer" is used similarly to "business development" which means sales. Personally, I would prefer an engineer to make a safety assessment rather than a developer in the assumed context, but I could be wrong about context. I didn't see Millennium Partners engineering firms on the first page of a Google search, though.

Maybe they mean safe in a context similar to "perfectly safe" from Zaphod Plays It Safe.

Re:Developers say it is safe? What about engineers

[Chrisq]

Re:Developers say it is safe? What about engineers?

Don't you think that people have had enough of experts?

Hi from New Zealand

[Mistakill]

After the 6.3 earthquake in Christchurch, NZ, 22 February 2011, we can tell you that what you thought was safe, isnt... We had buildings that should have survived the quake, but didnt...

And then we had a 7.8 in Kaikoura, on November 25 2016...I wouldn't want to be within a mile of this building in an earthquake

Measuring from space

[Melkman]

Wow, mapping a buildings from space with millimeter accuracy. From an orbit 693km high. That's an accuracy of 1:100,000,000 while flying 24,000 km/h.. Crazy. And then imagine the capabilities of really good US satellites aren't even known because classified.

The ESA link to this story: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-1/Satellites_confirm_sinking_of_San_Francisco_tower

Re:Measuring from space

[sims 2]

Thats pretty cool but I want something that can tell me where the gophers are in my yard when will it be accurate enough to do that?

Re:Measuring from space

[DarthVain]

Not to put a damper on the wonderment of modern science, but we've had very accurate survey level measurements using GPS for a couple decades now. They didn't go into their methodology (could have involved manual or GPS assisted ground truthing, then change monitored by imaging to calibrate the satellite for Europe), or statistical error. While the measurement is in mm, that isn't to say to what degree that measurement is statistically accurate or not. As mentioned, other analysis disagrees with the value given. If that is because of accuracy or because of bias was alluded, but not really stated

All that said still pretty cool details or no.

Re:Measuring from space

[poofmeisterp]

Wow, mapping a buildings from space with millimeter accuracy. From an orbit 693km high. That's an accuracy of 1:100,000,000 while flying 24,000 km/h.. Crazy. And then imagine the capabilities of really good US satellites aren't even known because classified.

The ESA link to this story: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-1/Satellites_confirm_sinking_of_San_Francisco_tower

THAT'S the damn thing that pulled an eye image when I looked to the sky the other day. I was wondering how in the hell the government of Jaiaguanaga found me after all of this time. *shakes fist at sky...and stuff*

Re:Measuring from space

[Melkman]

The measurements were not done on the ground or with GPS assistance. The payload of the Sentinel-1 satellite they used is the CSAR radar. That radar does automatic distance/altitude mapping of entire swaths. I'm just amazed by the precision.

Re:SF sinking further into hell

[stealth_finger]

Almost as if God is punishing them for something....

just very, very slowly?

Re:SF sinking further into hell

[stealth_finger]

Almost as if God is punishing them for something....

Like the rampant drug use, loose morals and homosexuality perhaps?

Nah, the smug.

Re:Developers say it is safe? What about engineers

[stealth_finger]

The building's developer, Millennium Partners, insists the building is safe for occupancy and could withstand an earthquake.

In this context, I would guess "developer" is used similarly to "business development" which means sales. Personally, I would prefer an engineer to make a safety assessment rather than a developer in the assumed context, but I could be wrong about context. I didn't see Millennium Partners engineering firms on the first page of a Google search, though.

Maybe they mean safe in a context similar to "perfectly safe" from Zaphod Plays It Safe.

Look, it's safe until it's not okay, now shut up and get in there.

Re:CAGW

[Kokuyo]

I'd be very sad to see the armory go. That building has a tangible, real world value to me personally... very personally :D.

Clever Design

[some old guy]

It's actually a self-secluding underground survival community for rich yuppies being deployed incrementally to save excavation cost.

Re:CAGW

[Maritz]

A more intelligent troll attempt than I would've credited a climate denier with. Well done.

Re:Firefox 0day is being used to attack Tor users

[Maritz]

Did you forget the HOSTS file bit? That formatting looks vaguely familiar...

Re:SF sinking further into hell

[Maritz]

God? Who? Which? Zeus? Thor?

Which fictional, made-up-by-humans God are you referring to?

Re:Developers say it is safe? What about engineers

[Maritz]

It makes perfect sense that the ignorant can convince the ignorant to ignore the educated. The race to the bottom is underway.

Measuring from space - Geology is IMPORTANT

[Anonymous Coward]

The imagery looks like the actual measurements are LiDAR derived.
Similar levels of accuracy are available from the GPS system when differential GPS is used. More information about GPS here:
Continuously Operating Reference Station (CORS) http://geodesy.noaa.gov/CORS/

It is rocket science, however today not surprising. The really hard part of this is that the data is available in near real time. See the Sentinel mission website
https://sentinel.esa.int/web/sentinel/missions.

Any time a building incurs settlement like this I wounder if the foundation layer - likely some sort of clay - is a thixotropic material potentially subject to liquefaction when shaken. Reference Jan. 17, 1995 Hyogo-Ken Nanbu Earthquake:Technical Paper on Liquifaction and,Earthquake Impact on Kobe

Obligatory Python quote

[Anonymous Coward]

"When I started here, all there was was swamp. All the kings said I was daft to build a castle in a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show 'em. It sank into the swamp. So, I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third one. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. An' that's what your gonna get, lad -- the strongest castle in these islands."

metric

[queBurro]

It has sunk about 16 inches...

errr, how many billion dollah landers are you going to smash into Mars before you start using the metric system? this is ridiculous.

Re:metric

[GabeGhearing]

It has sunk about 16 inches...

errr, how many billion dollah landers are you going to smash into Mars before you start using the metric system? this is ridiculous.

The USA hasn't crashed a Mars rover landing(there have been 4 so far)... I believe every lander Europe and Russia has sent to Mars has crashed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:metric

[Moof123]

No, but we lost a whole satellite due to a minor glitch, which was elevated by an engineer and dutifully ignored by his management...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:metric

[R3d M3rcury]

Right. Because of the use of the metric system. If they'd used real (i.e., US) measurements, it would have been fine. You start sticking in weird furrin' measurements and you have problems.

The problem with the metric system is that it makes the math easy. And anytime the math is easy, you're going to make mistakes. When the math is hard, you double and triple check it to make sure you haven't made some silly mistake.

(Yes, I'm being facetious.)

Re:CAGW

[Mashiki]

Has Guam flipped over yet? I'm just curious.

Re:Firefox 0day is being used to attack Tor users

[ArchieBunker]

So we can read about it next week after more posts about Trump?

Oh no! Are Austin and the Clinton library safe?

[raymorris]

> denying, you dumbshits, until all of SF topples into the bay.

Oh that's scary! But what would really, really worry me would be if Austin was at risk, or the Clinton Presidential Library and Adult Book Store.

You guys have got to work on your fear mongering. The "dumbshits" you're screaming at aren't THAT worried about San Hippy Francisco. I suppose if San Francisco headed underwater some of the residents and their assless leather pants might come HERE, so that's a BIT worrying.

Sinking: from the top, or ground?

[MrLogic17]

I'm sure the experts have thought of this, but don't see an answer: is the 16 inch sinking measured from the top of the tower, or from ground level?

In other words, does that measurement include settling within the 58 above-ground stories? I would think that a building that large would have some internal compaction over time, independent of the ground beneath it.

I presume that the ground surrounding the building is deformed downward with the building, otherwise the entrance threshold would have moved markedly compared to the street level. Road crews could probably identify pavement cracks in vaguely concentric rings around the building.

Re:Developers say it is safe? What about engineers

[Anonymous Coward]

A real estate developer is a company to "develops" raw land into a building. They can perform many different services but always at minimum are the "project manager" for turning raw land or under developed land into the developed land (aka buildings).

Now you don't have to make incoherent guesses while acting like you know what you are talking about.

Re:Nearby building

[The Grim Reefer]

So if the Millennium Tower tips over in an earthquake, I guess it would fall into the building that's just northwest of it. I wonder if the people in that building know that the Millennium Tower is leaning toward it.

Not to worry, I heard that Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho has a three point plan to fix it. Something to do with lashing it to a building on the southwest side with a big rope.

Try Building Hypnosis

[Suffering Bastard]

Of course it's safe, there's no doubt about that -- provided of course people believe in it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ujRE2IkEIo

Re: Nearby building

[jitterman]

I don't know why, but this made me laugh.

He's broke, he has no money to lend

[Anonymous Coward]

This is false: "That does not make sense. Businesses are kept separate for a whole slew of legal and tax related reasons."

No that's not true. He doesn't have money in any of these organizations to lend.

Berkshire Hathaway is all internal loans. Each company within the group lends spare cash to other companies in the group at market rates, and thus earns the interest charged as profits, instead of that profit going to banks. Warren Buffet buys specifically insurance companies, because they're cash rich and can lend that cash to other companies in the group. Insurance premiums are paid up front, but liabilities on the premiums arrive later. Interest earned is kept within the group, simply returning to the Insurance company as profit. Rather than being paid out to a bank. That's what cash rich companies do.

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/03/08/how-warren-buffett-borrows-77-billion-for-free.aspx

Currently Trump's companies shift revenue around. So investment money for one place, travels through the books as revenue in his other companies. Hence the 160% sudden increase in Miami National Doral revenue, without the corresponding increase in room rate or occupancy on that resort. That property is valued at $96 million, his lawyer says its only worth $75 million, yet it's borrowing is $125 million from Deutsch bank alone. A black hole of $50 million just comparing two different Trump company numbers and noticing the mismatch.

Same with the loss making Scottish golf resort, which he claims is profitable in the US figures he gave for that UK business, and yet makes a loss in the UK figures filed at companies house. Again two different numbers for the same thing files in two different places.

All of his businesses are like that. The mature New York buildings which should be debt free by now, are basically bankrupt. e.g. 40 Wall Street has $160 million mortgage, at 5.71 percent, i.e. $9.1 million mortgage and yet makes only $6.49 million profit. It doesn't make enough to service its debt.

Re:Developers say it is safe? What about engineers

[Enigma2175]

The building's developer, Millennium Partners, insists the building is safe for occupancy and could withstand an earthquake.

In this context, I would guess "developer" is used similarly to "business development" which means sales. Personally, I would prefer an engineer to make a safety assessment rather than a developer in the assumed context, but I could be wrong about context. I didn't see Millennium Partners engineering firms on the first page of a Google search, though.

Maybe they mean safe in a context similar to "perfectly safe" from Zaphod Plays It Safe.

Real estate developers are impeccably trustworthy, that's why we elected one as President. If the developer says it's safe, then it's safe!

I wonder why you can't see it up close.

[fredrated]

I just walked by the Tower and expected to see the foundation slab sunk below the level of the sidewalk, but nothing like that is visible, I wonder why?

Re:I wonder why you can't see it up close.

[ItsJustAPseudonym]

Did it start off *higher*, though?

Re:I wonder why you can't see it up close.

[bussdriver]

Steel buildings flex. I would wonder how stable their sensing is because if it doesn't average over time it could be movement of the building they are detecting... if not, how do they compensate for that?

Also, they are measuring from space so one would assume they can only measure the top and the street next to the building. Again we have a sampling problem in that both of those could change with temperature enough that I would think a tower would differ in height... even concrete has to have expansion joints... In addition, I would wonder about the extreme height, where slight shifts multiplied up the height would amount to noticeable amounts. We don't heavily measure the ground either, the earth itself might move around like really slow fluid that we are just now detecting (aside from the large quick earthquake shifts.) I'm just wondering...that whole city could be shifting around by smaller amounts (besides during earthquakes.)

What happens to the pipes and things underneath?

[Loconut1389]

There's only so much flex the gas and water and all that can have.. isn't that a gas and/or water disaster waiting to happen?

The answer

[ItsJustAPseudonym]

Engineers in San Francisco have tunneled underground to try and understand the sinking of the 58-story Millennium Tower.

"Hey, Bill, is the roof of this tunnel getting lower?"

Re:Developers say it is safe? What about engineers

[schnell]

In this context, I would guess "developer" is used similarly to "business development" which means sales.

What "developer" means in any real estate-related context is the company that bought the land when it had something else (or nothing) on it, figured out a business case for what to build on that land, got the permits, borrowed the money, built the building(s) and assumed the risk/reward of trying to sell the resulting building space to people or companies. It doesn't refer to any specific business function within the company, because any sizeable real estate developer will have on staff (or contracted) any number of people ranging from architects to engineers to project managers to accountants to people who make the glossy "buy an apartment here" brochure.

When a news article says that "[Company] said that..." what they mean is that someone authorized by the company to make statements on the company's behalf. That could be anyone from the CEO or a board member to a lawyer to a PR person.

Long story short, a "developer" incorporates all the functions above, even if the person saying the words is more likely from the sales or marketing side. But there's no way in Hell they are saying things unsupported by their engineers, architects, regulatory staff and lawyers because making willingly false statements about a building's safety can expose you to undreamed-of liability in the case of a failure. Also - this is San Francisco we're talking about. Do you think there's any chance that a building of this size wasn't subject to years upon years of government reviews for safety, stability, environmental impact, community impact, infrastructure impact, etc. etc. etc.?

Amazing Accuracy

[nuckfuts]

Let's just pause for a moment and reflect that we even have the ability to measure the position of a building within a centimeter or so using satellites orbiting the Earth.

I find it astonishing.

Re:Developers say it is safe? What about engineers

[LunaticTippy]

The race to the bottom is underway.

Goddamn this race is boring. 1.5 inches a year! I think racing lichen would be more entertaining.

Developers, Developers, Developers, Developers...

[knorthern knight]

Developers, Developers, Developers, Developers...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Re:Your kidding right?

[myid]

I don't know if the engineers are American. The website of website Millennium Partners is written in English and Chinese. The right side of their Contact Us web page lists offices in four cities: Hong Kong, Taipei, Shanghai and Singapore. And the bottom of that page lists those cities, plus Kuala Lumpur.