Wes Johnson

WJOHNSON@NEWS-LEADER.COM

As it moves closer to a late summer grand opening, the newly renamed Wonders of Wildlife Museum and Aquarium will soon showcase some of its most impressive exhibits on a gigantic outdoor video screen 80 feet wide and 30 feet tall.

The curved screen is on track to be installed in July and will be viewable from Campbell Avenue, according to Bass Pro Shops spokesman Jack Wlezien.

"It uses LED lights for the screen, like you see at giant sports arenas, but this one is curved and will serve a different purpose," he said. "It's pretty unique for museums and aquariums."

Construction crews recently affixed metal beams and electric cables to the big curved wall on the aquarium's east side. When the museum and aquarium opens, passers-by will get a glimpse of what's inside.

There likely will be video feeds of the live otter tank and spacious shark aquarium that will help distinguish the WOW facility from the adjacent Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World store, Wlezien said.

Construction crews are completing work on new exhibits and two new glass elevators as they prepare for the official opening. Wlezien said no firm date has been set beyond a late-summer opening.

Visitors will have the opportunity to walk more than a mile through exhibits ranging from thousands of live fresh and saltwater fish to African, arctic and mountain exhibits featuring taxidermied animals in hand-painted, lifelike settings. Other exhibits tell the story of Ozarks caves (complete with a flock of live bats) and cypress swamps, with live alligators, a black bear, bald eagle and owls, and venomous reptiles.

The presentation is being designed to be an "immersive experience" for visitors, and will literally be that for some folks brave enough to swim with the sharks.

Aquarium staff are working out the details for allowing divers and volunteers to swim inside the massive shark tank, teeming with numerous species of ocean fish. Swimming among them: white tip and black tip sharks, bonnet head sharks, brown sharks and a 9-foot sand tiger shark.

"A lot of people who love to scuba dive might not get up close and personal with marine animals," said managing director Mickey Black. "If they dive in here, they can."

He said the aquarium also is planning to allow volunteer divers to help clean some of the tanks. Details to come.

About the new name. Bass Pro Shops founder Johnny Morris has spent more than $100 million renovating and massively expanding the former Wonders of Wildlife, which closed in 2007, aiming to turn it into a museum and aquarium that will draw visitors nationwide.

It initially was named America's Wildlife Museum and Aquarium, but the name was retooled to better represent what it had to offer, with a nod to its WOW roots.

The facility at the corner of Sunshine and Campbell will now be called the Wonders of Wildlife National Museum and Aquarium, Wlezien said.

Editor's note: This story has been updated to correct the spelling of Jack Wlezien's last name.