Abuja Stadium
Interior view of the stadium
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| Full name | Abuja National Stadium |
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| Location | Abuja, FCT, Nigeria |
| Capacity | 60,491 (football) |
| Surface | Grass |
| Construction | |
| Broke ground | 2000 |
| Opened | 2003 |
| Construction cost | $360 million |
| Architect | Schlaich Bergermann & Partner, Germany |
| Tenants | |
| Nigerian national football team | |
Abuja National Stadium (also known as National Stadium or Abuja Stadium) is an all-seater national sports stadium located in Abuja, the rapidly developing Federal Capital Territory of Nigeria. The stadium serves as a home to the Nigerian national football team, as well as a center for various social, cultural, and religious events. The Federal Government of Nigeria approved the contract for the construction of the National Stadium complex and Games Village on July 18, 2000. The stadium was constructed to host the 8th All Africa Games which took place in October 2003. The 60,491 seater is an ultra modern multipurpose sports complex.
The contract for the design of the stadium was awarded to Schlaich Bergermann & Partners, a world-renowned structural engineering firm based in Stuttgart, Germany. They were responsible for the architectural design, execution planning, as well as constructional supervision of the stadium. The construction was done in co-operation with a local engineering firm that has served the country for decades. Julius Berger Nigeria PLC, a subsidiary of Bilfinger Berger SE, was responsible for the construction of the main stadium, providing man-power, supplies, and equipment for the execution of the project. The contract for the construction of the Games Village, a housing facility for visiting athletes, was awarded to China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation. Abuja stadium is one of the 50 most expensive stadiums ever built in the world.
The Abuja National Stadium main bowl is designed to accommodate 60,491 spectator seats covered by a lightweight roof construction. The main characteristics are the two overlapping spectator tiers; the lower tier accommodating 32,000 seats and the upper tier 28,000 seats. The lower tier also incorporates 56 corporate suites with viewing terraces and one presidential lounge for 50 guests. All functional and secondary areas are accommodated in the entrance building which provides a gross floor area of approximately 25,000 m². This building is arranged below the concourse level which serves as the spectators‘ distribution level and therefore provides several kiosks, banks, first aid stations and toilet buildings. The structure of the stadium is a combination of insitu and precast concrete elements. There are 36 towers supporting the upper tier and the roof structure. These towers are founded on 140 bored piles with diameters of 1.30 m and 1.50 m in a depth of 8.00 m to 30.00 m. Precast concrete elements varying between 13 and 15 meters in length are placed between the towers, forming the spectator stands. A total of 6,300 precast elements were produced in the company’s production yard 15 kilometers away. The towers are connected on the top by a 2.50 m high and 2.00 m wide hollow concrete ring beam with a wall thickness of 0.35 m. The roof structure is fixed on 36 massive concrete points to the ring-beam. For the first time in the world, the ringbeam for this kind of roof structure was made of concrete. The roof structure itself is a cable construction with a weight of 800 tons carrying a 28.000 m² membrane.
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Wikipedia