1 of 2 | People gather around the in mosque in Cairo to perform the morning prayer on the first day of the Eid al-Adha holiday marking the end of the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, on Sunday on June 16, 2024. At least 1,301 died on the trek this year. Photo by/UPI | License Photo
A lack of cooling centers, sleeping accommodations, and other critical support services made the effects of the heat wave that killed at least 1,300 Hajj pilgrims even more deadly, according to eyewitnesses and media reports.
The Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia is considered one of the five main tenets of Islam, and while the people who take the trek are required to register and receive proper permits, many don’t. Those participants tend to be the most vulnerable. Advertisement
Of the people who died, more than half were unregistered and 600 of them were from Egypt alone, according to media reports from Agence France-Presse.
Temperatures exceeded 125 degrees Fahrenheit in Mecca during the five-day trek that began June 14th, and saw a registered 1.8 million people attempt the journey to the holy city, although the actual tidal was much higher.
That’s because Saudi Arabia approves a total of 1.8 million free Hajj visas each year, but hundreds of thousands of people who can’t secure one, either because of the limited number or because of cost, still find ways to participate in the trek, often by using tourist visas which are provided by unlicensed travel agents. That leaves officials more unprepared than they otherwise would be to prepare for, and respond to emergencies. Advertisement
There has been no official death toll released by either Egypt or Saudi Arabia, the two countries where the Hajj takes place, but CNN reported that it was at least at least 1,301.
Islam requires every Muslim who is physically capable of completing the Hajj at least once in their lifetime to do so, but even for those who are healthy, the rituals and practices include spending extended periods of time outside and walking long distances, and can prove dangerous, according to the Islamic Relief Agency. This year, the extreme heat and lack of services made the situation even worse.
As host of one of the world’s largest religious gatherings, Saudi Arabia is facing growing scrutiny over its management of the Hajj as temperatures have risen steadily in recent years, and the trek is becoming increasingly dangerous.
Saudi Arabia has warmed at a rate that is 50% higher than the rest of the Northern Hemisphere over the last 40 years, according to a 2021 study published by the American Meteorological Society.
“Human survival in the region will be impossible without continuous access to air conditioning” if the climate trends continue, the report said.
The journal Geophysical Research Letters reported in 2019 that climate change will elevate heat stress for Hajj pilgrims to levels exceeding the “extreme danger threshold” from 2047 to 2052 and 2079 to 2086, “with increasing frequency and intensity as the century progresses,” the report said. Advertisement
