A video clip of members of the royal family reacting to a pyrotechnic explosion during Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations has gone viral, after fans uploaded an edited version to social media platform TikTok.
The British monarchy celebrated its first ever Platinum Jubilee in 2022, when Queen Elizabeth surpassed the 70-year milestone of her accession to the throne. The country marked the occasion with a number of celebratory events, including a pop concert outside Buckingham Palace and a special pageant.
Elizabeth, aged 96, was too frail to participate in the majority of the planned events, suffering from what was described by the palace at the time as “episodic mobility issues.”
The video footage that has gone viral shows Prince William and Kate Middleton’s three children—Prince George, 9, Princess Charlotte, 7, and Prince Louis, 4—with their parents and the queen as she made her final Buckingham Palace balcony appearance before her death just three months later.
The monarch made a surprise appearance on the balcony to close the Jubilee celebrations, with crowds joining along The Mall to sing the national anthem: “God Save The Queen.”
At the close of the anthem, two large air cannons exploded, releasing red, white, and blue smoke in a display of patriotism. These explosions made the royal children visibly jump with shock with their reactions caught on camera.
Uploaded to TikTok by user l0velycatherine, the viral video captioned “their reactions 😭🤣,” has been viewed over 1.5 million times, receiving in excess of 112,000 likes and 100 comments.
“Prince Louis look like he was drifting off in space I think the noise brought him back into reality 🤣,” wrote one user, with another adding: “Even the queen had a little giggle haha.”
“George and William had the same reaction,” one commenter noted, with a further user saying: “Kate went into laughing mode immediately 😂🥰🥰.”
The jubilee celebrations saw George, Charlotte and Louis make an increasing number of public appearances as they attended the Trooping the Color parade as part of the carriage procession for the first time and the pageant.
George and Charlotte also made their first joint visit to Wales with their parents during the weekend of events, and went to the Platinum Party at the Palace pop concert, which included performances from artists Alicia Keys, Elton John and George Ezra.
During the pageant on the final day, it was Prince Louis who stole the show with his reactions in the royal box, at one point losing his temper and another bouncing from knee to knee of family members, eventually ending up with his grandfather, the then -Prince Charles (now King Charles III).
At the end of the celebrations, William and Kate posted to Twitter to thank the crowds of well-wishers they met throughout the weekend with a special nod to Louis.
“Thank you to everyone who turned out to show their gratitude to The Queen and her inspiring 70 years of leadership. From the crowds on the Mall to communities hosting street parties up and down the country, we hope you had a weekend to remember,” the couple said in a rare authored tweet, adding:
“We all had an incredible time, especially Louis… 👀 W & C.”
The next large-scale royal family event to take place will be King Charles’ Coronation in May and though the ceremony itself may be too long for all the Wales children to attend, it’s expected that they might participate in the wider celebrations, including a concert at Windsor Castle.
James Crawford-Smith is Newsweek’s royal reporter based in London. You can find him on Twitter at @jrcrawfordsmith and read his stories on Newsweek’s The Royals Facebook page.
Do you have a question about King Charles III, William and Kate, Meghan and Harry, or their family that you would like our experienced royal correspondents to answer? Email royals@newsweek.com. We’d love to hear from you.
A video clip of members of the royal family reacting to a pyrotechnic explosion during Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations has gone viral, after fans uploaded an edited version to social media platform TikTok.
