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TIME: Almanac 1993
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TIME Almanac 1993.iso
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060192
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06019912.000
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1992-09-10
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973b
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THE WEEK, Page 23WORLDIt's Falling (Really!)
The Leaning Tower of Pisa gets a steel girdle to hold it up
They've been saying it for eight centuries, but this time
it's really true: the Leaning Tower of Pisa could fall down any
minute. The white marble monument, which now leans 16.5 ft. off
center at the top, has been closed to tourists for two years
while an international panel of experts came up with a plan for
saving it. Everybody has ideas, including a Florentine who
suggested erecting a massive statue of Pisa's patron, St.
Ranieri, to hold up the bell tower, but engineers finally
decided on a more mundane approach. About 800 tons of lead
ingots are to be installed at the base to counter the tower's
precarious inclinations. To give it some support in the
meantime, workers last week began girdling the structure with
18 steel bands.