150 000 queue to honour Reagan
2004-06-10 16:33
Washington - Huge crowds queued on Thursday to pay tribute to former president Ronald Reagan, whose coffin lay in state in Washington ahead of a national funeral service on Friday.
Up to 5 000 people an hour filed past Reagan's coffin in the United States Capitol building where the casket will remain until the service at the Washington National Cathedral.
People waited outside the Capitol in sweltering temperatures for up to five hours to get a chance to pay last respects.
Police expect more than 150 000 people to see the coffin in the 34 hours it is to be on display.
More than 100 000 filed past while it was "lying in repose" for two days at the Reagan presidential library in California this week.
Reagan died on Saturday at the age of 93, after a 10-year battle with Alzheimer's disease.
Vice-president Dick Cheney led tributes to Reagan at a state funeral ceremony in the Capitol Rotunda on Wednesday night.
Salute by 21 F-15 jets
That followed a procession through Washington when the coffin was placed on a gun carriage and followed by a riderless horse symbolising the fallen warrior.
Twenty-one F-15 jets staged an aerial "missing man" tribute and a 21-gun salute was fired in the grounds of congress.
Cheney honoured the conservative icon as "more than an historic figure".
"He was a providential man who came along just when our nation and the world most needed him," said the vice-president.
Echoing a scene earlier this week at Reagan's presidential library, the ex-president's widow, Nancy, gently caressed the casket.
Empire State turns off lights
Margaret Thatcher, the former British prime minister who was one of Reagan's strongest allies, also sadly placed her hand on the coffin.
Thatcher will present a tribute that was pre-recorded because of her failing health at Friday's national funeral.
President George W Bush and his father, ex-president George Bush, who was Reagan's vice-president, and former Canadian prime minister Brian Mulroney will give eulogies.
The state funeral is the first since former president Lyndon Johnson died in 1973.
The Empire State Building, the tallest in New York, was to turn off its famous lights on Thursday and Friday in honour of Reagan.
- AFP