FLOOD WARNING Click county for more information: Le Flore         FIRE WARNING Click county for more information: Johnston        

Visible to the naked eye is the damage the Rose Window sustained during the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building bombing.

Now, the frame is further deteriorating, prompting the Oklahoma City National Memorial to call in an expert for repairs.

The Rose Window hung on the west side of the sanctuary at First United Methodist Church in downtown Oklahoma City. The church kept the stained-glass and donated its wood frame to the memorial.

Moving the frame indoors negatively affected it. Paint is chipping. Wood is expanding and cracking.

"We want to preserve it to the time of the bombing because it's a mission of the museum," said conservator Camilla J. Van Vooren, who works for the Western Center for the Conservation of Fine Arts in Denver.

Van Vooren's description of her meticulous, time-consuming task: "I'm using a syringe to introduce a little bit of alcohol to break the surface. Then I inject a water-based glue-like substance into the cracking paint to stop flaking and chipping."

Van Vooren also is stabilizing cracks and weakness in the wood. The paint never will completely adhere to the frame, but Van Vooren said that's not a goal.

"I'm not preserving it. I'm conserving it," she said.