VATICAN CITY – Italian police have deployed over 4,000 personnel, including an anti-drone force, to ensure heightened security is in place during the papal conclave, which has already entered its second day.
When white smoke rises in the Sistine Chapel’s chimney, up to 250,000 people are expected to gather at St. Peter’s Square and its adjoining streets and plazas, Italian news agency ANSA reported, citing Italian police.
Up to a thousand volunteers will be deployed within the succeeding hour before the new pope appears at the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica.
Police forces have been deployed at key sites in Rome, including the Papal Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, where Pope Francis is laid to rest.
Heightened security is put into place at Fiumicino Airport, Roma Termini central train station, and other locations where pilgrims are expected to arrive to reach Rome and head to the Vatican to watch the first appearance of the new pope.
Ongoing conclave
Earlier, black smoke rose from the chimney at 11:50 a.m. (Philippine time), signalling that no cardinal received a majority vote during the two ballots on Thursday morning.
As of 4:00 p.m. Vatican time (10:30 p.m. Philippine time), the 133 cardinal electors are still engaging in the vote to elect Pope Francis’s successor.
Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, the Dean of the College of Cardinals, told Italian media on Thursday that he hopes to see white smoke upon his arrival in Rome from his visit to Pompeii.
“I hope that when I return to Rome this evening I will find white smoke already,” Battista Re said, as quoted by Italian media.
The 91-year-old cardinal is ineligible as cardinal electors over 80 are no longer allowed to participate in the conclave.
Cardinal Battista Re said he was “happy to be here at the beginning of the conclave,” referring to the Pro Eligendo Pontifice Mass that he officiated before the cardinal electors entered the Sistine Chapel on Wednesday to bein the conclave.
“I am particularly happy to be here at the beginning of the conclave so that the Holy Spirit may blow strong, so that the Pope that today’s Church and the world needs may be elected,” he said. — BAP, GMA Integrated News