The glass used in the new Grand Canyon Skywalk has a connection to French kings & the Palace of Versailles. The durable, ultraclear glass for the bridge was manufactured by Saint-Gobain, a 300y-old Paris firm that supplied the glass in 1682 for the palace's famed Hall of Mirrors. More recently, Saint-Gobain also made the glass used in the "Pyramid" building at Paris' Louvre museum. The tempered, laminated Skywalk glass, which is more than 2" thick, was manufactured at a plant in Cologne, Germany. It contains less iron oxide than regular glass, increasing clarity. It's capable of withstanding a magnitude 8.0 earthquake & winds of 100mph. Saint-Gobain, the world's largest supplier of building materials including abrasives & ceramics, generated $52BN sales in 2007. It employs 200,000 people worldwide
