The Eiffel Tower, one of the most visited attractions in Paris - nay, the world - welcoming almost seven million visitors per year, opened 129 years ago today. Read on for some very fascinating facts. 
  • Completed on March 31, 1889, the tower was the world’s tallest man-made structure for 41 years until the completion of the Chrysler Building in New York in 1930. 
  • It is 324 metres tall (including antennas) and weighs 10,100 tonnes.
  • It was the tallest structure in France until the construction of a military transmitter in the town of Saissac in 1973. The Millau Viaduct, completed in 2004, is also taller, at 343 metres.
  • It is possible to climb to the top, but there are 1,665 steps. Most people take the lift.
  • The lifts travel a combined distance of 103,000 km a year – two and a half times the circumference of the Earth.
  • Victor Lustig, a con artist, "sold" the tower for scrap metal on two separate occasions.
  • During cold weather the tower shrinks by about six inches. 
  • Gustave Eiffel, the engineer and architect behind the tower, was also involved in a disastrous attempt by the French to build a canal in Panama, and his reputation was badly damaged by the failure of the venture.
  • Eiffel also designed interior elements of the Statue of Liberty.
  • He died while listening to Beethoven's 5th symphony.
  • Since its opening more than 250 million people have visited the tower.
  • Today the tower welcomes almost 7 million people a year, making it the most visited paid-for monument in the world.​
Picture

​​




  • HOW LONG DID IT TAKE TO BUILD THE EIFLLE TOWER?

  • Its construction took two years, two months and five days - 180 years fewer than Paris's other great attraction, Notre Dame.
  • During the German occupation, the tower's lift cables were cut, and the tower closed to the public. Nazi soldiers then attempted to attach a swastika to the top, but it was so large it blew away and had to be replaced with a smaller one.

​
​​  
  • In 1944, as the Allies approached Paris, Hitler ordered Dietrich von Choltitz, the military governor of Paris, to demolish the tower, along with other parts of the city. The general refused.
  • Repainting the tower, which happens every seven years, requires 60 tonnes of paint.
  • The tower was the main exhibit at the 1889 Exposition Universelle (World’s Fair), held to commemorate the centennial of the French Revolution.
  • One attendee at the 1889 World's Fair was Sir John Bickerstaffe, Mayor of Blackpool. So impressed was he at the new attraction, he has a similar tower built on the English seafront.19. The tower appears in the 1985 Bond film A View to a Kill. There is a scene in the Jules Verne restaurant, and a fight in the stairway.
  • Semolina Pilchard climbs the Eiffel Tower in the Beatles song I Am the Walrus.
  • 21. There are a number of other replicas around the world, including one in Las Vegas and one at the Window of the World theme park in Shenzhen, China.
  • The tower played a part in the Allied victory at the First Battle of the Marne, in 1914. One of its transmitters jammed German radio communications, hindering their advance.
  • It was originally intended to stand for 20 years before being dismantled, but its use as a wireless telegraph transmitter (in cases such as the one above) meant it was allowed to stay.
  • French car manufacturer Citroen used the tower as a giant billboard between 1925 and 1934 – the company name was emblazoned on the tower using a quarter of a million light bulbs – and was recorded as the world’s biggest advertisement by the Guinness Book of Records.
  • In 2008 a woman with an objects fetish married the Eiffel Tower, changing her name to Erika La Tour Eiffel in honour of her ‘partner’.
  • The tower comprises 18,000 metallic parts, joined together by 2.5 million rivets.
  • To mark the 125th anniversary of the Eiffel Tower’s completion the British Virgin Islands launched a special tower-shaped $10 coin.
  • A number of aviators have flown an aircraft under the arches of the tower. In 1926 Leon Collet was killed after a failed attempt.
  • The tower sways around six to seven centimetres (2-3 inches) in the wind.
  • Gustave Eiffel kept a small apartment of the third floor for entertaining friends. It is now open to the public.
  • The Eiffel Tower and Margaret Thatcher share the same nickname - La Dame de Fer ("The Iron Lady").
  • In 1960 Charles de Gaulle proposed temporarily dismantling the tower and sending it to Montreal for Expo 67. The plan was rejected.
  • The names of 72 engineers, scientists and mathematicians are engraved on the side of the tower, each of whom contributed to its construction.
  • In the computer game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, the tower is toppled by an airstrike.
  • There are 20,000 lightbulbs used on the Eiffel Tower to make it sparkle every night.