Authorities in Saudi Arabia said Thursday more than 300 people had been killed in a stampede at Mina, east of the Muslim holy city of Mecca, where 2 million people are on the annual hajj pilgrimage. Riyadh's Civil Defense Authority said at least 450 people had been wounded. The circumstances of the stampede were not immediately clear. Saudi police have blocked the roads leading to the disaster site. Authorities said the number of fatalities was expected to rise. The pilgrimage, the world's largest annual gathering, has been the scene of deadly disasters in the past, including stampedes, tent fires and riots. The last major hajj incident took place in 2006, when at least 346 pilgrims were killed as they attempted to perform the stoning of the devil ritual at Jamarat. However, massive infrastructure upgrades and extensive spending on crowd control technology over the past two decades made such events far less common. Thursday's incident took place on Street 204 of the camp city at Mina, one of the two main arteries leading through the camp to Jamarat, where pilgrims ritually stone the devil by hurling pebbles at three large pillars. Mina contains more than 160,000 tents where pilgrims spend the night during the pilgrimage. Photographs published on the Civil Defense Authority's Twitter feed showed pilgrims lying on stretchers while emergency workers in high-visibility jackets lifted them into an ambulance. It said more than 220 ambulances and 4,000 rescue workers had been sent to the stampede's location to help the wounded. The Saudi-owned Al Arabiya television channel showed a convoy of ambulances driving through the Mina camp, saying the wounded had been rushed to four hospitals in the area, and some had been airlifted by helicopters to hospitals in Mecca. "Work is underway to separate large groups of people and direct pilgrims to alternative routes," the Saudi Civil Defense Authority said on its Twitter account. Thursday is also Eid al-Adha, one of two religious holidays celebrated by Muslims worldwide. It has traditionally been the most dangerous day of the hajj, because vast numbers of pilgrims attempt to perform rituals at the same time in a single location. 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.
Over 300 killed in deadliest hajj stampede since 2006
Saudi authorities say more than 450 people wounded in crush in Mina, a tent city east of Mecca housing tens of thousands of people on the annual pilgrimage • Cause of the incident still unknown • Authorities predict number of casualties will rise.
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