Queen Elizabeth’s death and funeral

Follow more news on Queen Elizabeth II’s death and funeral here.

The coffin of Queen Elizabeth II, adorned with the Imperial State Crown, rests on a raised platform inside London's Westminster Hall on Wednesday, September 14.

The coffin of Queen Elizabeth II is now at London’s Westminster Hall, where the monarch will lie in state before her state funeral on Monday.

The Queen’s son, King Charles III, was joined by his sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, and other members of the royal family as he walked behind the coffin during its procession route Wednesday.

See more photos from Wednesday’s procession:

Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, walk behind Prince William and Catherine, the Princess of Wales, as they leave Westminster Hall on Wednesday.

People gather in London's Hyde Park, where video screens broadcast Wednesday's events.

The King watches his mother's coffin arrive at Westminster Hall.

The Queen's coffin is covered with the Royal Standard as it is carried to Westminster Hall.

People line up in London for the chance to pay their respects to Queen Elizabeth II on Wednesday.

The end of the queue for people to view Queen Elizabeth II lying in state is currently near London Bridge, according to the UK government’s live tracker. 

The queue is approximately 2.9 miles long (about 4 kilometers), the tracker says.

Speaking to the BBC on Wednesday, UK Culture Secretary Michelle Donelan said that the government is expecting “extremely large queues, that could go up to thirty hours.”

She added that “it won’t be thirty hours for everybody” but said that it was important people knew how long it could potentially take.

Donelan added that there will be more than 1,000 people per day on hand to help those in the queue, including from the Samaritans, the Red Cross, and the Metropolitan Police.

A woman who waited for two days to pay her respects to Queen Elizabeth II at Westminster Hall said she became emotional as she passed by the late monarch’s coffin.

Grace said that all the chairs have been taken away in Westminster Hall and mourners are in a single line to file past the Queen’s coffin.

“I was sad, just so sad not to see her again,” she said.

The first members of the public were seen entering Westminster Hall to view Queen Elizabeth II’s coffin lying in state after the hall was officially opened to the public at 12 p.m. ET (5 p.m. local time). 

The Queen will lie in state until the morning of her funeral on Monday.

Tesco supermarkets across the UK will close on the day of the late Queen’s state funeral, Tesco announced in a statement on Wednesday.

However, some shops will remain open as an exception. 

“A small number of our London stores will be open along the funeral procession,” the statement added.

People in a 2.5-mile-long line (about 4 kilometers) in London to pay their respects to Queen Elizabeth II explained why they wanted to visit her coffin in Westminster Hall.

A group told Stewart that they were told the line could last about five hours from where they stood, but the queue is moving.

PBS announced a change in programming plans for coverage of the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II.

“The U.S and the Holocaust,” a three-part film directed by documentarian Ken Burns, will no longer air on Monday to accommodate special programming from PBS and BBC around the funeral.

Episode 1 of the docuseries will still premiere on Sunday, with the second episode moving to Tuesday.

Catherine, Princess of Wales is driven behind the coffin of Queen Elizabeth on Wednesday.

Catherine, the Princess of Wales, wore a diamond and pearl leaf brooch that belonged to Queen Elizabeth II at the short service marking the arrival of the late monarch’s coffin at Westminster Hall, according to the UK’s Press Association.

The coffin of Queen Elizabeth II is carried on a horse-drawn gun carriage of the King's Troop Royal Horse Artillery on Wednesday.

The King’s Troop Royal Horse Artillery, which led the procession of Queen Elizabeth II’s coffin from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Hall earlier on Wednesday, has about 50% female regiment members, according to a defense source.

There is not a deliberate reason that a large number of the regiment members are women, the defense source told CNN.

“The King’s Troop Royal Horse Artillery role includes the firing of Royal Salutes to mark the grand occasions of State, including The Queen’s Birthday Parade, Royal Birthdays and Births,” according to the British Army website.

Pavlos, Crown Prince of Greece, told CNN that his cousin, Queen Elizabeth II, was “one of the kindest people I knew.”

“She was always smiling … knowledgeable about everything… and had a very good sense of humor,” he said.

He also expressed his love and praise for King Charles III, and he acknowledged the unique position of being an heir.

“What you’ve been waiting for your whole life is also the saddest day of your life,” he said.

King Charles III, according to Pavlos, is “best prepared” to inherit the Crown due to his vast knowledge of his country and the Commonwealth that he has acquired through his charity work under the Prince’s Trust.

Around 100 employees at King Charles III’s former official residence, Clarence House, were given notice that they could lose their jobs after he became king, the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) said Wednesday.

Some employees have worked there for decades, PCS noted.

“While some changes across the households were to be expected, as roles across the royal family change, the scale and speed at which this has been announced is callous in the extreme. Least of all because we do not know what staffing the incoming Prince of Wales and his family might need,” PCS General Secretary Mark Serwotka said.

Clarence House’s press office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

A sign directs people to the queue for Westminster Hall on Wednesday.

Britain’s capital city expects hundreds of thousands of people to visit Queen Elizabeth II as she lies in state in Westminster Hall ahead her funeral on Monday, the mayor of London Sadiq Khan told CNN, adding that the situation was “unprecedented.” 

“We expect to see over the course of the next few days hundreds of thousands of people personally pay their respects to her majesty the Queen, but also we expect to see prime ministers, presidents, members of the royal family, and others from across the globe,” he continued. 

“The really reassuring thing is our King, King Charles III, had the best possible mentor, and the best possible apprenticeship and that’s why I’m so confident he will be a wonderful king,” he added.

As world leaders and their teams arrive in London for the Queen’s funeral, Khan said the city has never before seen such crowd and this presence.

The number of mourners far exceeds the scale of other events, such as the London Olympics and other Royal events, he said, suggesting that the crowds for the Queen’s passing are larger than all those events combined.

“If you think about the London marathon, the carnival, previous royal weddings, the Olympics – it’s all that, in one,” Khan said. 

“This is a massive operation and we’re working really hard together to make sure that we can do her, we can do King Charles, we can do the Royal Family, our city, our nation, and the Commonwealth, what it deserves,” the London mayor added.

King Charles III and Camilla, the Queen Consort leave Westminster Hall after the procession.

King Charles III and the rest of the Queen’s relatives have filed out of Westminster Hall, following the short service marking the arrival of the late monarch’s coffin.

In less than two hours, the doors of the hall will open to the public for her lying-in-state.

Queues are already weaving through central London and unprecedented numbers of mourners are expected.

Members of the public queue on the South Bank as they wait to view Queen Elizabeth II lying in state.

The live queue tracker for people attending Queen Elizabeth II’s lying-in-state is now live on YouTube.

As of 10:26 a.m. ET on Wednesday, it says the line is approximately 2 miles long, with the nearest landmark to the end of the queue being Blackfriars Bridge.

This is being updated as the queue moves.

US President Joe Biden spoke with King Charles III on Wednesday, the White House announced.

The rare call between a US President and a monarch comes ahead of Biden’s attendance at Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral on Monday and days after the King ascended to the British throne.

Biden, offered “his condolences on the passing of Queen Elizabeth II,” the White House said in a readout of the call.

It added: “The President recalled fondly the Queen’s kindness and hospitality, including when she hosted him and the First Lady at Windsor Castle last June. He also conveyed the great admiration of the American people for the Queen, whose dignity and constancy deepened the enduring friendship and special relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom. President Biden conveyed his wish to continue a close relationship with the King.” 

The coffin carrying Queen Elizabeth is placed in Westminster Hall.

Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, is giving a service after the Queen’s coffin was placed in Westminster Hall.

Welby, the most senior bishop in the Church of England, read an opening prayer and an extract from John 14.

The Queen’s coffin is being carried into Westminster Hall by the bearer party, having completed its journey from Buckingham Palace.

As the coffin enters, the Choir of Westminster Abbey and the Choir of His Majesty’s Chapel Royal, St. James’s Palace, is singing Psalm 139.

The Queen’s procession has passed The Cenotaph on Whitehall, where the late monarch would attend annual Remembrance Day events recognising Britain’s war dead each November.

Her coffin is approaching Westminster Hall, and will arrive in the next few minutes.

Along the way it also passed a statue of Winston Churchill, the last person to receive a state funeral in Britain in 1965.

The Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby told CNN it is a “gift” to “play a part in saying goodbye” to Queen Elizabeth II.

He is due to lead a short service once the Queen’s coffin has arrived at Westminster Hall on Wednesday.

It is a huge privilege and honor to be part of the occasion, he said.

“It’s also a very solemn moment because I had the privilege of meeting the Queen on many occasions,” he added. “There’s a deep sense of loss.”

Asked what some people might not have known about the Queen, the Archbishop of Canterbury said her “extraordinarily quick sense of humor” and her “phenomenal memory.”

The Archbishop of Canterbury is the principal leader of the Church of England, of which the British monarch is the head.