The military C-17 Globemaster carrying the monarch’s casket touched down at RAF Northolt, an air force base west of the city, about an hour after it left Edinburgh on Tuesday.
U.K. Prime Minister Liz Truss, Defense Secretary Ben Wallace and a military honor guard were among those greeting the coffin before it was loaded into a hearse. Motorists pulled over and stopped in a show of respect as the illuminated hearse traveled under police escort on a London highway.
Crowds gathered on London’s streets to cheer and weep as the motorcade proceeded to Buckingham Palace, where the country’s new King Charles III, the late queen’s oldest son, and other members of Elizabeth’s immediate family met the hearse at the ceremonial gates.
The coffin will spend a final night at the queen’s London home. A horse-drawn gun carriage is expected to take it Wednesday to the Houses of Parliament to lie in state for four days before a Monday funeral at Westminster Abbey.
The queen died Sept. 8 at Balmoral Castle in northern Scotland after 70 years on the throne.
The coffin of Queen Elizabeth II returned to a drizzly Londay on Tuesday evening, making its way toward the monarch’s home Buckingham Palace as crowds lined the route to catch a glimpse of the hearse and to bid her a final farewell.
The queen’s body made its final journey to London from Balmoral Castle in northern Scotland, where the monarch died Sept. 8 at age 96 after 70 years on the throne.
It traveled past thousands of people who gathered in the rain along the road. Some had parked their cars along the normally busy route, got out and waved as the hearse passed.