MAKKAH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Hundreds of people died during this year’s hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia as worshipers faced intense heat at the desert kingdom’s Islamic holy site and people tried to claim the bodies of their loved ones, officials said Wednesday. .
Saudi Arabia has not commented on the death toll from the heat during the hajj, which every competent Muslim must experience once in their lifetime, or provided any cause of death. However, hundreds of people queued at the emergency center in Mecca’s Al-Muaisem neighborhood, trying to get information about the missing family members.
A list circulated online shows that at least 550 people died during the five-day hajj. A doctor who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss information not released publicly by the government said the names listed appeared to be authentic. The doctor and another official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said they believed there were at least 600 bodies inside the facility. The list did not provide a cause of death.
Each year, the hajj attracts hundreds of thousands of pilgrims from low-income countries, “many of whom have had little or no access to health care before the hajj,” says an article in the April edition of the Journal of Infection and Public Health. The newspaper added that contagious diseases can spread among gatherings of people, many of whom have sacrificed their lives to travel and may be older people with pre-existing health conditions.
This year’s death toll, however, suggests something is causing the surge. Several countries, including Jordan and Tunisia, have said some pilgrims have died due to the heat that swept through the holy site of Mecca.
Temperatures in Mecca and surrounding holy sites reached 47 degrees Celsius (117 degrees Fahrenheit) on Tuesday, according to Saudi Arabia’s National Meteorological Center. Onlookers saw some people faint while trying to symbolically stone the devil.
Authorities said temperatures at Mecca’s Grand Mosque reached 51.8 degrees Celsius (125 degrees Fahrenheit) on Monday even though pilgrims had traveled to Mina.
Others, including many Egyptians, lost contact with loved ones in the heat and crowds. According to the Saudi Hajj authorities, more than 1.83 million Muslims will participate in the Hajj in 2024, including more than 1.6 million pilgrims from 22 countries and approximately 222,000 Saudi citizens and residents.
An Egyptian man fell to the ground Wednesday at a medical center in Mecca when he heard the name of his mother among the dead. He cried for a while, then grabbed his cell phone and called the travel agency, shouting: “He left her to die!” The crowd tried to comfort the man.
Security at the complex appeared to be tight and an official read out the names and nationalities of the dead, which included people from Algeria, Egypt and India. Those claiming to be relatives of the deceased were allowed in to identify the deceased.
The Associated Press could not independently confirm the cause of death of the bodies inside the complex. Saudi officials did not respond to requests for more information.
Saudi Arabia’s ruling family maintains significant influence in the Muslim world through its oil wealth and management of Islam’s holy sites. Like the Saudi monarchs before him, King Salman has been given the title of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, referring to the Great Mosque in Mecca, the Cube Kaaba where Muslims pray five times a day, and the Prophet The mosque is located in the Prophet’s Mosque in Mecca.
Saudi Arabia has spent billions of dollars on crowd control and security measures for people attending the annual five-day pilgrimage, but the sheer number of participants makes it difficult to ensure their safety.
Climate change may make the risks even greater. A 2019 study by MIT experts found that even if the world succeeded in mitigating the worst effects of climate change, temperatures during the Hajj in 2047 to 2052 and 2079 to 2079 would exceed “extreme danger thresholds.”
Islam follows the lunar calendar, so the Hajj starts about 11 days earlier each year. In 2030, the Hajj will be performed in April, and in the following years, the Hajj will be performed in the winter when temperatures are milder.
An Associated Press tally shows that a stampede in Mina during the 2015 hajj killed more than 2,400 pilgrims, making it the worst incident at a pilgrimage site. Saudi Arabia has never acknowledged the full toll from the stampede. On the eve of the Mina disaster, a crane collapsed at the Grand Mosque in Mecca, killing 111 people.
The second deadliest event during the Hajj was the stampede in 1990, which killed 1,426 people.
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