After closing up a year and a half ago for major repairs the battleship texas. Reopens this weekend. Also fireworks displays of course planned across the houston area but will wet weather scuttle at all. I'm craig cohen today on houston matters what's happening at battleship texas. Also harris county's fire marshal joins us to offer some safety tips. Should you decide to set off your own fireworks whether you're supposed to or not then some thoughts on what it means to be an american also a reporter from the guardian on why houston's hotter in some parts of town than others and what it has to do with tree cover economics and lack of zoning plus a step forward in the generations long pursuit of viable flying cars our non expert panel weighs in on that and other intriguing developments this week on the good the bad and the ugly. We'll start with the news update from npr news. Eighty eight seven. Stay with us. This is houston matters. I'm craig co and good morning coming up. This hour rain in the forecast may tamp down demand for fireworks. Good thing because supply is down. Should you decide to set off some yourself whether you are supposed to or not. We'll have some safety tips for you. Also a step forward in the decades long pursuit avaiable. Flying cars really yes. Our non expert panel weighs in on the good the bad and the ugly i though the battleship texas closed a year and a half ago for major repairs but the museums lowering the gangway this fourth of july weekend the texas texas is notable for many firsts. She's the first ship to launch. An airplane offered deck was the first to use her Us early radar technology and after her retirement became the state's first ship museum this weekend. Guests can see new additions to an exhibit honoring. Dr john mcardle junior world. War two medical officer who served aboard the ship. Candice trujillo is the vice president of visitation and special events with battleship texas foundation. Candace good morning. Welcome thank you for being here. What can guests expect from the ship's opening this weekend so we are doing a very limited access because the ship has been a construction site for so long so Main deck a little bit of second deck including the ward room which will have living history people explaining a little bit more about world war two in the ship as well as our first hologram aboard the ship in that's honoring dr Mcardle and his family graciously donated the funding for that exhibit. So he'll talk a little bit more about his world war two experience in that hologram and the battleship of course was active during both world. Wars cracks yet. So i if i recall correctly maybe the only ship or one of the only guests in world war two. Exactly what else should we know about her. Service in world wars She was in the different theaters of the war. So she earned five major battle stars so the first one being At operation torch north africa as well as she was that day. She was firing at omaha. Beach point to hall as well as Southern france and then she moved to the pacific theater where she was at iwo jima in it and at okinawa. An interesting fact at okinawa. They were at battle stations for over fifty days so if you can kind of imagining being that mindset and you know the crew attributed a lot of why they weren't hit by kamikazes is because they were ready at their battle station you mentioned. It's been a construction site essentially for the last year and a half what what repairs would would What's been made what's been done. So right now are. They've been focusing on getting her prepared to go to drydock so we will have to take the ship to another location to get it repaired. Go get it out of the water. And and basically fix her whole So they've actually pumped in a marine foam into her torpedo blisters so that when we moved the ship the leaking that has been causing. All of the problems won't happen. And she was able to safely get to the drydock so they've pumped out seven survey pumped in about seven hundred thousand gallons of the expanding foam where these repairs to take place. We currently have an elo wire letter of intent with a drydock shipyard of facility and we were hoping very Very soon Announced where that will be a recall. There was talked before the pandemic about permanently moving the battleship texas to a new location. Has anything been decided on that. So yes she will be permanently moved from her current Sanjay santo She will be moved to a location in the greater galveston houston area We've had proposals from interested parties. Were still considering them You know you mentioned the pandemic 'em so that kind of affected our negotiations with the shipyards. So we were focusing on getting that done first and the now hopefully when we have a contract in place the board will shift to meet you know making those plans with the interested. Parties more concrete. And we'll get that going and so hopefully we'll be able to announce something soon as well getting back to the weekend's events. We have a steady expectation of rain all weekend. Long as that impact. What you have I mean i kind of just people check the weather come win. Hopefully that. it's not raining will be there A lot of it is an outdoor activity. But we will have like i said the second deck. The ward room will be opened and that has air conditioning as well the vice president of visitation and special events with the battleship.