Oklahoma Aquarium

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Main entrance of the Oklahoma Aquarium.

The mangrove environment near the Stingray Touch Tank.

The Oklahoma Aquarium is located on a 66 acre (26.71 hectare) campus along the banks of the Arkansas River in Jenks Oklahoma, a southern suburb of Tulsa. The 72,000 ft² (6689 m²) facility was built in 2002 over the site of a sewage containment facility and municipal dog pound with the expectation to bring nearly 500,000 visitors to the Tulsa metropolitan area annually [1]. The opening of the Oklahoma Aquarium on May 28, 2003 was one of the state's largest and most exciting events in recent Oklahoma history to make such a wide-spread impact.

On display is an ever growing array of exotic marine life, as well as fish and freshwater environments native to Oklahoma. The aquarium's showcase attraction is Shark Adventure, a 500,000 gallon (1893 m³) shark tank, complete with a shark tunnel that allows visitors to walk 'through' the shark environment. Near the middle of the tunnel is a 12 ft (3.66 m) high, 20 ft (6.1 m) wide all-acrylic observation dome designed to give unobstructed, 360-degree views of the entire tank and its bull shark and lemon shark inhabitants. Part of the Oklahoma Aquarium's unique appeal is the permanent exhibition of over 20,000 items of fishing tackle in the Karl and Beverly White National Fishing Tackle Museum, the largest antique fishing tackle collection in the world.

In July 2003, Discovery Channel's famed naturalist and noteworthy filmmaker Nigel Marven (along with crew) documented four bull sharks, at home in the architecturally innovative half-million gallon tank. The resulting shots and commentary were featured in the 2003 edition of Discovery Channel's Shark Week series.

The Aquarium is a great improvement over the previous use of the site, a sewage retention pond. However it is quite ironic that to this day visitors to the site go there to see things floating in water.