“Without food, water or air conditioning” in 52°C: several hundred dead during the pilgrimage to Mecca

Environ 1,8 million de fidèles ont pris part au rite musulman. EPA – STRINGER

Environ 1,8 million de fidèles avaient pris part, cette année, à ce grand rassemblement musulman, dont 1,6 million arrivés de l’étranger, selon les autorités saoudiennes.

Several dozen people wandered through hospitals in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, looking for their loved ones who went missing during the hajj, the great Muslim pilgrimage which turned into a tragedy.

More than 900 deaths have been recorded this year, according to Le Monde, due to scorching temperatures. While social networks, like Facebook, are flooded with photos of missing people and requests for information, a new report, relayed by RFI and AFP, reported 922 deaths on Wednesday evening.

"52 degrees in the shade"

The gathering, which ended on Wednesday, took place once again in the middle of summer, in one of the hottest regions on the planet. Under this blazing sun, temperatures reached on certain days"52 degrees in the shade at 3 p.m., in the central" area of ​​the Grand Mosque from Mecca, according to the Saudi meteorological services, cited by the website of the Al-Arabiya television channel.

According to Courrier International, on Sunday alone, 27,000 cases of heat exhaustion were also recorded.

Approximately 1.8 million faithful took part this year in this large Muslim gathering, including 1.6 million arriving from abroad, according to the Saudi authorities .

But tens of thousands of pilgrims also try to participate without official authorization, which effectively prohibits them from accessing air-conditioned facilities. According to a diplomat, this could explain the very large number of Egyptian victims, many of them being, in fact, in this situation.

"No food, water or air conditioning"

These people "have been without food, water or air conditioning for a long time", explains, in Le Monde, an Egyptian official who oversaw the pilgrimage for his country.

They died "due to the heat, because most of them had nowhere"&nbsp ;where to take shelter, he emphasizes.

At least 60 Jordanians also died, as well as 68 Indian nationals. "Some [deaths] are due to natural causes, we have had many elderly pilgrims. Others are due to weather conditions, that's what we assume", explains the diplomat of an Asian country in Saudi Arabia, under the cover of anonymity.

Tunisia, Indonesia, Iran, Senegal and Iraqi Kurdistan have also reported deaths.

In 2015, a tragic stampede

The hajj, one of the five pillars of Islam, consists of a series of rites performed at different times. Mecca and its surroundings. All Muslims are expected to complete them at least once in their life if they have the means and can benefit from the quota of places allocated to them. à their country. But the organization of this gathering is complicated by global warming and has sometimes been disrupted. overwhelmed, too, by tragic crowd movements. One of them had caused the attack. the death of 2,300 people in 2015. Since then, the authorities have carried out an attack. à major developments, including an expansion of the Al-Haram mosque, which should be completed by the end of the year. next year, according to Le Monde.