SsangYong Engineering and Construction completed the landmark Marina Bay Sands Hotel in Singapore using its own technologies
A trio towers that look like two cards leaning against each other with a ship-like SkyPark connecting them 200 meters up in the sky appeared in Singapore on June 23 after two years of construction. The Marina Bay Sands Hotel is the jewel of the Marina Bay Sands Integrated Resort project being pushed by the Singapore government as a new future growth engine. In September 2007, SsangYong E&C won the bid for the construction, the largest ever Korean construction company overseas project and worth a total US$ 686 million (about 900 billion won).
The June 23 grand opening ceremony drew a lot of attention from all around the world, and attracted many important figures, including S,Joon,Kim, Chairman of Ssangyong E&C, Sheldon Adelson, Chairman of Las Vegas Sands Corp., Oh Joon, Korean Ambassador to Singapore and Kwek Leng Beng, Chairman of Hong Leong Group as well as some 1,200 reporters.
The hotel is a composite of three 55-story buildings with three floors underground and a total of 2,561 rooms. The east legs, which are inclined 52 degrees, meet the west legs at the 23rd floor (70 meters high) and then rise together to the 55th floor, making an I˝ shape, and is considered the most difficult construction project currently being undertaken. SsangYong successfully finished the project, which is ten times more inclined than the Leaning Tower of Pisa, using a Post-Tensioning technique; a world first .As this method was recently designated a new technology (No. 608) by the Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime Affairs in Korea, SsangYong will get extra points when applying for public construction projects and receive approximately 15% the cost if it is used for similar projects.
The 343-meter-long and 38-meter-wide SkyPark consists of three swimming pools, the world’s largest observation deck, gardens, walking trails, restaurants and spas. It is 20 meters longer than the Eiffel Tower, twice as large as a soccer field (12,408 square meters) and weighs over 60,000 tons. Transfer trusses were used to bear the load over the lower part of the towers. The observation deck, which can hold up to 900 people, is a cantilever spanning nearly 70 meters, almost the same length s a Boeing 747 passenger plane. During construction of the deck, the company used a hydraulic jack to raise a 7,000-ton steel beam frame 200 meters up into the air.
Some 6,000 workers from ten countries including the United States, China, and Thailand have been involved in the construction, working in two shifts around the clock and attaining ten million work hours without a single accident, a remarkable record given the difficulties stemming from the different languages and lifestyles of workers.
“Even world-renowned construction companies were concerned about this project saying, ‘it is attainable only in imagination’” said Ahn Kook-jin, field supervisor of the project.
“We demonstrated that our construction capability and technologies are world-class by completing the project in only 27 months, something which would have normally taken 48 months,” he added.