Happy New Year! Spectacular fireworks display in London takes country into 2024

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Tens of 1000’s of revellers braved the chilly and blustery climate to see London’s breathtaking New Year’s Eve firework present because the UK welcomed in 2024 with a bang.

There wasn’t a spare place to face alongside the River Thames close to the London Eye as folks from all world wide gathered to look at the 12-minute lengthy spectacular which additionally featured a drone gentle present and music.

Those in attendance, some ready since 7.30am, cheered because the countdown began earlier than the bongs of Big Ben sounded at midnight and the 12,000 fireworks lit up the darkish and damp night time sky.

The unity-themed display started with “London: A Place for Everyone” written excessive above the crowds earlier than a sequence of options together with the marking of the King’s coronation 12 months, the seventy fifth anniversary of the NHS and the 10-year anniversary of same-sex marriage turning into authorized in England and Wales.

The spectacle additionally used Charles’ quote to mark the seventy fifth anniversary of the Windrush crossing in which he stated the brand new arrivals “collectively enrich the fabric of our national life”.

Further messages all through the present have been heard from Mayor of London Sadiq Khan, Dame Helen Mirren, Bella Ramsey, Stephen Fry, Joanna Lumley, George the Poet, and Baroness Floella Benjamin, who learn a poem by the late Benjamin Zephaniah.

The present in the capital, that includes music from the likes of the Spice Girls, Louis Armstrong and Dua Lipa, was joined by occasions up and down the country, together with in Edinburgh the place folks joined the thirtieth Hogmanay road get together, headlined by reformed band Pulp.

There have been additionally firework shows on the Blackpool Tower and on Newcastle’s Quayside the place a laser present was projected on to the Baltic Flour Mills.

However, it wasn’t the night time everybody had hoped as occasions in Barnstaple and Plymouth, each in Devon, needed to be cancelled as a result of sturdy winds impacting coastal components of southern England and Wales.

London’s spectacular celebrations got here earlier than New York’s well-known annual occasion, and after enormous reveals throughout most main cities in Europe, Asia, Australia and Japan.

Eye-catching pyrotechnic shows passed off over Victoria Harbour in Hong Kong and from Auckland’s tallest constructing, Sky Tower, in New Zealand.

But Sydney stole the present of the early celebrations as one in 5 of the town’s residents converged on places round its well-known Harbour Bridge for an enormous fireworks display.

The native authorities, which calls its metropolis the “New Year’s Eve capital of the world”, made the harbour bridge dance with color with 7,000 fireworks as round 1 billion watched from throughout the globe.

On the Opera House, which is marking its fiftieth anniversary, there have been some 75,000 pyrotechnic gadgets which exploded from the constructing. The complete display, which lasted 12 minutes, used round 8.5 tonnes of fireworks and took 15 months to plan.

The worldwide celebrations all began on the island of Kiribati in the Pacific Ocean, and have been adopted, first, by Tonga, Samoa and New Zealand, the place an enormous firework display, accompanied by a laser gentle and animation present, lit up the cloudy night time sky.

Australia adopted earlier than occasions in North Korea and South Korea, the place in the capital Seoul a surprising bell ringing ceremony passed off. It was then the flip of Hong Kong, Taiwan and China.

The Chinese celebrated the brand new calendar 12 months comparatively quietly, with most main cities banning fireworks over security and air pollution considerations.

Then in India, 1000’s of revellers from Mumbai flocked to a bustling promenade to look at the solar set over the Arabian Sea. In New Delhi, fireworks raised considerations that the capital could be blanketed by a poisonous haze on the primary morning of the brand new 12 months.

But whereas billions of individuals indulged in the night time of celebration, a stark reminder issued by Pope Francis of the heartache and struggling for a lot of throughout 2023.

In his conventional Sunday blessing from a window overlooking St Peter’s Square, he supplied prayers for “the tormented Ukrainian people and the Palestinian and Israeli populations, the Sudanese people and many others”.

“At the end of the year, we will have the courage to ask ourselves how many human lives have been shattered by armed conflict, how many dead and how much destruction, how much suffering, how much poverty,” the pontiff stated.

The wars, significantly in Gaza and Ukraine, have raised tensions the world over – and with hundreds of thousands attending occasions there was excessive safety deliberate, together with in New York the place police created a “buffer zone” round Times Square.

In France, some 90,000 cops have been deployed to beef up safety on the celebrations with the country beneath a “very high terrorist threat”.

But there appeared no hassle on the Champs Elysees boulevard the place 800,000 folks have been stated to have greeted the brand new 12 months in a mass get together with an Olympic theme forward of Paris 2024.

And there have been comparable scenes at a live performance on the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin the place 1000’s watched 20 dwell acts to have fun the flip of the 12 months.

In London, Mr Khan stated on X shortly after midnight: “From London to the world: a message of unity, love & hope.”

People responded, praising the present, which was designed by the Cambridgeshire-based pyrotechnics agency Titanium Fireworks.

They included Jamie Wallis, who wrote: “Thank you for putting on a world class fireworks display, we are the envy of the world on NYE. It feels like this year could be one of real change and something to be excited about.”