More than 1000 Muslims have died due to heatstroke under the scorching heat in Saudi Arabia. Source: Fadi El Binni via Flickr.
During the annual Hajj pilgrimage in Saudia Arabia, more than 1300 people have died from heatstroke due to extreme heat.
Hajj is the fifth pillar of Islam, and all Muslims—who are financially and physically able—are required to make the pilgrimage at least once in their lives. The pilgrimage usually takes five to six days in the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
Temperatures on Tuesday 18 June reached 47 degrees Celsius in Mecca and sometimes exceeded 51 degrees throughout the week.
Many complained that there was not enough water and cooling stations for all the pilgrims.
On Sunday, Saudi Arabia’s health minister Fahad Al-Jalajel blamed the fatalities on pilgrims “walking long distances under direct sunlight without adequate shelter or comfort”.
A number of elderly people and those suffering from chronic disease were among the fatalities.
The dead included more than 650 Egyptians, at least two Americans, and one Australian.
“It’s only by God’s mercy that I survived, because it was incredibly hot,” Aisha Idris, a Nigerian pilgrim, told the BBC.
Al-Jalajel said that about 83% of the 1,301 fatalities were not authorised to make the pilgrimage.
Egyptian officials accused the high death toll on tourism companies that arranged unregistered pilgrims to enter Mecca via unofficial channels.
Egypt set up a crisis unit tasked with investigating the situation, and have already suspended licenses of 16 tourism companies that provided unregistered Hajj pilgrimage packages.
The tourism companies were also referred to the public prosecutor to be fined and compensate the families of the deceased pilgrims.
Authorities in Jordan have also said they detained several travel agents who allowed pilgrims to travel to Saudia Arabia through unofficial channels.
The total number of Hajj pilgrims travelling to Mecca this year has reached 1.8 million, with 1.6 million of them from outside Saudi Arabia, according to the Saudi General Authority for Statistics.
Each year, thousands of people attempt to perform the Hajj through illegal channels because of the steep costs of Hajj package tours.
Heat-related deaths at Hajj are not new and have been recorded back to the 1400s.
The timing of the Hajj is determined by the Islamic lunar calendar and shifts forward each year. This has unfortunately made Hajj season fall in summer for the past several years.
