Fort Worth Stock Show & Rodeo changes parade route after hotel explosion

The Fort Worth Stock Show & Rodeo’s All Western Parade will go on Saturday, only slightly different than originally planned.

Because of street closures related to the explosion at a downtown hotel on Monday, the route is being changed.

On Saturday, the parade will still begin at its usual location at Main and Weatherford streets, just south of the old Tarrant County Courthouse, at 11 a.m.

From there the parade will go south on Main to the convention center where, instead of taking 9th Street west over to Houston Street, it'll now go east toward Commerce Street. Once on Commerce Street, it'll head back north to Weatherford Street.

Organizers said Wednesday that reserved seating locations will remain at Sundance Square and the convention center.

A map of the modified parade route is below.

While the Stock Show and Rodeo are changing some plans due to the investigation, the extreme winter weather in the forecast is a different story.

The first participants for the stock show have already been rolling into Dickies Arena, with some arriving from out of state.

“We are getting settled in after our trip from Denver,” said Nicolas Diaz, co-director of Jerry Diaz Productions.

It was a trip that saw them pass through the remnants of a blizzard that hit the Texas panhandle, sending some vehicles off the road and leaving families to take more action to protect their horses from the cold.

“We have different weighted blankets for inside the trailer, it gets very airtight,” Diaz said. “And we have to keep it just where they get enough oxygen for it to stay fresh in there, but that it’s not losing too much heat.”

Participants have been arriving in a city bracing for its arctic blast: temperatures in Fort Worth on Monday and Tuesday have been forecasted to fall into the low teens.

The stock show told NBC 5 they might take additional safety measures like salting the roads and sidewalks around the arena, but all events were set to continue regardless of the weather.

“Like right now they’re putting down bedding for the horses so they stay nice and comfortable with their legs and everything,” Diaz said.

Participants said with this expected cold, they needed to keep their horses’ water from freezing and make sure the animals had heavy blankets if they were staying outside.

But they weren’t worried – they were excited for Fort Worth’s biggest show to go on.

“It will go on, nothing will change and we still encourage people to come out,” Diaz said. “Because most of the venues are indoors and they have so many great activities to do.”