Scorching heat turned Mecca, a place of pilgrimage and peace, into a scene of heartbreak this year. Over 1,300 devout pilgrims lost their lives under the unforgiving Arabian sun, with temperatures exceeding a brutal 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit). Saudi health officials revealed that a staggering 83% of the fatalities were unauthorized pilgrims, many of them elderly, who undertook long walks in the intense heat to perform Hajj rituals.
Hajj is one of the five pillars of Islam, requiring every Muslim who is physically and financially capable to journey to Mecca at least once in their lifetime. Apart from Mecca, the birthplace of the prophet Muhammad, pilgrims also visit Mount Ararat and other religious sites.
Of the 1,300 dead pilgrims, 660 were from Egypt, over 200 were from Indonesia, almost 100 were from India and the remainder were from Pakistan, Malaysia, Iraqi Kurdistan, Senegal, Iran, and Sudan.
Special Hajj visa needed
To reach Mecca, pilgrims are required to have special paid-for visas that are issued by the Saudi authorities otherwise they risk being fined, jailed or deported. Holders of visitor visas and tourists are banned from the Hajj pilgrimage.
Nevertheless, unscrupulous tour companies exploit the lax visa system.
“They lure people with cheap Hajj trips on tourist visas, then abandon them upon arrival,” Ayman Salama, a 60-year-old Egyptian pilgrim explained.
This forces pilgrims to navigate the crowded city without the appropriate permits, with limited access to water, and having to endure extreme heat.
The devastating death toll has spurred the authorities in Saudi Arabia and neighboring countries to crack down on these illicit operators. Jordan and Egypt have announced arrests among dozens of tourism companies and in Tunisia, the Minister of Religious Affairs has been fired.
Merciless heat
Saudi Arabia’s National Meteorological Center reported temperatures of 51.8 degrees Celsius in Mecca during the pilgrimage period. Heat exhaustion forced almost half a million pilgrims, including over 140,000 without permits, to seek healthcare services at local hospitals, the country’s Health Ministry reported.
Extremely high temperatures are not new for the region, with experts noting that they have been registered there since the 1400s and they warn that the ongoing climate change will merely worsen the situation.
According to Indian climate expert, Souvik Chongder, the disruption of the climate cycle due to human-caused climate change is a critical factor. Rising temperatures, like the 0.4°C per decade increase observed in Saudi Arabia, make heatwaves more frequent and intense.
Better infrastructure needed
At the same time, Chongder told DevelopmentAid that the current situation cannot be blamed solely on the environment, stating:
“We can’t just point fingers at climate and the environment”.
He proposed proactive measures such as improved building design with proper ventilation and shading to reduce reliance on air conditioning. Additionally, initiatives like seed ball distribution in remote areas could promote vegetation growth and mitigate the impacts of intense heat.
Mabrouka Khedir, an environmental expert, echoed this noting that the impact of natural climate variations was minimal compared to human activity. She identified the Gulf region’s dependence on extractive industries and large energy projects as being major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions, a key driver of global warming. Saudi Arabia, the world’s top oil producer, serves as a prime example, with its oil production and consumption directly linked to rising temperatures
Next year’s Hajj will also occur during the summer. While the authorities have acknowledged the dangers of extreme heat and taken measures to mitigate the impact on pilgrims, this year’s high number of cases of heatstroke and deaths indicate that Saudi Arabia needs to do more to address this major public health risk.
