London – Queen Elizabeth II She completed her last leg last flight Home of Buckingham Palace.
It was the coffin of the late British king Flying from Edinburgh, ScotlandShe flew back to London on Tuesday, then was taken to her official home – six days earlier than she was due State funeral in Westminster Abbey.
Thousands of people gathered at the palace on Tuesday evening before the state assembly arrived. It was raining as the crowd looked on in near-silence, and some mourners were seen tracking the car’s movements on their phones.
People raised their necks, hoping to catch a glimpse of the car, saying they were there to bear witness to what they believed to have happened once in a lifetime, no matter how they felt about the Queen and the monarchy.
The crowd erupted in cheers and applause as hearts rushed into the palace, the last time the Queen would come home in a long time.
Anna Freitas, 39, was among those outside the palace. She moved to London from Portugal 15 years ago and sheds tears when she talks about the Queen.
“She was a perfect woman,” Freitas said. “She was a simple, perfect woman.”
Thousands of people gathered at Buckingham Palace in recent days to pay their respects to the Queen, laying bouquets of bright flowers and handwritten notes outside the gates.
The arrival of the Queen’s coffin was a closely watched moment in the series of commemorative events that followed The Queen’s death Thursdayat the age of 96.
Elizabeth’s coffin has been flown to RAF Northault near London aboard an RAF C-17 Globemaster, RAF Commander Marshal Mike Wigston told Sky News.
Wigston told the broadcaster that the plane was used to evacuate civilians from Afghanistan and to transport humanitarian aid and weapons to Ukraine after the Russian invasion.
Tens of thousands of people have already paid tribute in London as well as in Scotland, where the Queen died last week and who played a key role in her posthumous procession.
It was Elizabeth Very fond of ScotlandEspecially the Highlands and Balmoral Castle belonging to her family. Crowds in nearby towns and villages lined the streets on Sunday Her body was limping on her crooked path to Edinburgh.
In the Scottish capital, throngs greeted along the Royal Mile, a steep cobbled street that leads to the Palace of Holyroodhouse, where her body was taken and she was visited by King Charles III and other members of the royal family.
Then Charles and his brothers—Anne, Andrew, and Edward—followed the coffin back up the road to St Giles’ Cathedral in a procession held almost in complete silence, punctuated by cannon fire from Edinburgh Castle at one-minute intervals.
Then the royal family stood by her coffin in a vigil in the cathedral.
Some people waited more than six hours to see the sarcophagus while it lay in St Giles, as the line stretched for more than a mile through the city’s scenic sandstone old town.
“I was sad about it, but seeing her there makes it… real,” said 20-year-old Charlotte Morrison, who is from Aberdeen but is in college in Edinburgh.
Daniel Arkin reported from London; Alexander Smith reported from Edinburgh, Scotland.
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