New Year’s Eve revelers pack NYC’s Times Square under tight security

The Times Square Ball App (Google Play and iTunes) and the Times Square Crossroads App (Google Play and iTunes) will also host the New Year’s Eve live stream. Heavily-armed officers stood on almost every corner as others with rifles and binoculars surveyed the crowd from rooftops above.

Times Square was to be spotless before the sun came up on New Year’s Day. An illuminated sign at the bottom of the skyscraper lit up to say “2016” as we reached the new year.

The New Year’s Eve 2015 live stream starts at 3pm EST (8pm GMT) but the ball raising kicks off the official start of the broadcast at 6pm EST (11pm GMT).

With the nation still jittery over shooting massacres in California and Paris, New York City officials sought to assure revelers Tuesday that the New Year’s Eve celebration in Times Square will be the safest place in the world – heavily secured by thousands of New York Police Department officers, including a new specialized counterterrorism unit. Most importantly, however, is the easy access it provides to the annual dropping of the ball at Times Square. “It’s the times we live in, but what we want people to do is come into Times Square, have a great time for themselves”.

In the hours before the ball drops from the top of a narrow wedge of a building at the southern end of the square, revelers will be entertained by musicians such as Carrie Underwood and Jessie J performing on multiple stages set up in the area.

New Year’s partiers began filing in in midtown Manhattan early Thursday morning.

Along with those million people in Times Square, an estimated 100 million Americans and 1 billion people worldwide watched it all happen from home. Wow!

Almost 6,000 officers will be assigned to the festivities.

Before entering Times Square, visitors were required to pass through tight security checkpoints, with police stopping anyone from carrying backpacks and large bags into the area while searching smaller bags and scanning people with metal detectors.

Once inside the square, spectators were to be funneled into one of the dozens of viewing pens where law enforcement officers can closely monitor and control the crowd.