At least 717 pilgrims were killed on Thursday in a stampede outside
the Muslim holy city of Mecca, Saudi authorities said, the worst
disaster to strike the annual hajj pilgrimage in 25 years.
At
least 805 others were injured in the crush at Mina, a few kilometres
east of Mecca, caused by two large groups of pilgrims arriving together
at a crossroads on their way to performing the "stoning the devil"
ritual at Jamarat, Saudi civil defence said.
Thursday's disaster
was the worst to befall the pilgrimage since July 1990, when 1 426
pilgrims were crushed to death in a tunnel near Mecca. Both stampedes
occurred on Eid al-Adha (Feast of the Sacrifice), Islam's most important
feast and the day of the stoning ritual.
Photographs published on
the Twitter feed of the Saudi civil defence on Thursday showed pilgrims
lying on stretchers while emergency workers in high-visibility jackets
lifted them into an ambulance.
The
hajj, the world's largest annual gathering of people, has been the
scene of numerous deadly stampedes, fires and riots in the past, but
their frequency was greatly reduced in recent years as the government
spent billions of dollars upgrading and expanding hajj infrastructure
and crowd control technology.
Safety during hajj is a politically
sensitive issue for the kingdom's ruling Al Saud dynasty, which presents
itself internationally as the guardian of orthodox Islam and custodian
of its holiest places in Mecca and Medina.
Unverified video posted
on Twitter showed bodies, clad in the white towelling of those
undertaking hajj, lying on the ground by the side of the road,
surrounded by debris, as pilgrims and rescue workers attempted to revive
them.
Jamarat
Street 204, where the
stampede occurred, is one of the two main arteries leading through the
camp at Mina to Jamarat, the site where pilgrims ritually stone the
devil by hurling pebbles at three large pillars. In 2006, at least 346
pilgrims died in a stampede at Jamarat.
Reuters reporters in
another part of Mina said they could hear police and ambulance sirens,
but that roads leading to the site of the disaster had been blocked.
"Work
is underway to separate large groups of people and direct pilgrims to
alternative routes," the Saudi Civil Defence said on its Twitter
account.
It said more than 220 ambulances and 4 000 rescue workers
had been sent to the stampede's location to help the injured.
Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya television channel showed a convoy of ambulances
driving through the Mina camp. Some of the wounded were evacuated by
helicopters.
An Arab pilgrim who did not want to give his name
said he had hoped to perform the stoning ritual later on Thursday
afternoon, but was now too frightened to risk doing so.
"I am very
tired already and after this I can't go. I will wait for the night and
if it not resolved, I will see if maybe somebody else can do it on my
behalf," he said.
Efforts to improve safety at Jamarat have
included enlarging the three pillars and constructing a three-decker
bridge around them to increase the area and number of entry and exit
points for pilgrims to perform the ritual.
More than 100 000
police and thousands of video cameras are also deployed to allow groups
to be dispersed before they reach dangerous levels of density.
"Please
pilgrims do not push one another. Please leave from the exit and don't
come back by the same route," an officer kept repeating through a
loudspeaker at Jamarat.
Two weeks ago 110 people died in Mecca's
Grand Mosque when a crane working on an expansion project collapsed
during a storm and toppled off the roof into the main courtyard,
crushing pilgrims underneath.
Thursday, September 24, 2015
More than 700 pilgrims dead in stampede
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