The Burj Khalifa is founded on pile supported raft foundation consisting of 194 bored-in-situ piles or drilled shafts as we commonly call them in the US with a 12 foot thick mat. The piles were 1.5 meters (5 feet) in diameter and extended 140 feet below the mat. The piles had an allowable axial load of 3,000 tonnes (6,614 kips) and load tests were performed on piles up to 6,000 tonnes. This article by the foundationconcretes.com discusses the foundation system of the world's tallest skyscraper, and discusses some of the issues and design features of a pile supported raft foundation. [Source: Read more at Structural, Concrete and Foundation Engineering. Image: Foundation Concretes.com]
