Edinburgh gun salute marks Queen's Platinum Jubilee

Queen Elizabeth II marked her Platinum Jubilee on Monday, becoming the first British monarch to reign for 70 years. The official start of the occasion was marked with simultaneous gun salutes in Edinburgh and London's Green Park.  She became monarch on the death of her father, King George VI, on February 6, 1952.

Elizabeth surpassed Queen Victoria as Britain's longest-serving monarch in 2015. In her statement Sunday, the monarch remembered the death of her father, which elevated her to the throne, and recalled the seven decades of “extraordinary progress” that her reign has spanned.