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Annual hajj pilgrimage to take place later this month

Thomson Reuters Posted: Sep 11, 2015 1:15 PM ET Last Updated: Sep 11, 2015 2:43 PM ET

         
A view from inside the Grand Mosque showing a part of a large crane that crashed into the mosque on Friday, killing dozens of people.

          A view from inside the Grand Mosque showing a part of a large crane that crashed into the mosque on Friday, killing dozens of people. (EPA)         

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Saudia Arabia's civil defence authority says the number of people killed when a crane crashed into Mecca's Grand Mosque on Friday has risen to at least 87. The accident comes just weeks before the Muslim annual hajj pilgrimage.

The information came from the authority's head, speaking to Al Ikhbariya television

The civil defence said on its Twitter account 154 people were also injured in the accident. Al Arabiya television earlier said the crane had fallen because of strong storms. Western Saudi Arabia has been hit by strong sandstorms in the last few days.

 

Pictures circulating on social media showed pilgrims in bloodied robes and masses of debris from a part of the crane that seemed to have crashed through a ceiling.

Mecca-crane-collapse

Millions of Muslims descend on Mecca's Grand Mosque, above, for the annual Haj pilgrimage. (Muhammad Hamed/Reuters)

Saudi authorities go to great lengths to be prepared for the millions of Muslims who converge on Mecca to perform the sacred pilgrimage.

Last year, the kingdom reduced the numbers permitted to perform hajj for safety reasons because of construction work to enlarge the Grand Mosque.

The pilgrimage, one of the largest religious gatherings in the world, has been prone to disasters in the past, mainly from stampedes as pilgrims rushed to complete rituals and return home. Hundreds of pilgrims died in such a stampede in 2006.

Saudi authorities have since lavished vast sums to expand the main hajj sites and improve Mecca's transportation system, in an effort to prevent more disasters.

Security services often ring Islam's sacred city with checkpoints and other measures to prevent people arriving for the pilgrimage without authorization.

Those procedures, aimed at reducing crowd pressure which can lead to stampedes, fires and other hazards, have been intensified in recent years as security threats grow throughout the Middle East.

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Crane crashes down into Mecca’s Grand Mosque — in pictures

September 12, 2015, Source

 

The crane accident happened as pilgrims from around the world converged onto Mecca, Islam’s holiest site, for the annual Haj pilgrimage, which takes place this month, killing dozens. The civil defence authority announced the collapse and a series of rising casualty numbers on its official Twitter account.

 

A collapsed crane and emergency services vehicles are seen near the Grand Mosque in Mecca on September 11, 2015. Saudi Interior Ministry General Directorate of Civil Defense via AP

FM

Saudi emergency teams gather at the site of accident in the Grand Mosque of Saudi Arabia’s holy Muslim city of Mecca on September 12, 2015, after a construction crane crashed into it. A massive construction crane crashed into Mecca’s Grand Mosque in stormy weather on, killing at least 107 people and injuring 238, Saudi authorities said, days before the annual Haj pilgrimage. AFP photo

FM
Originally Posted by Cobra:
Originally Posted by Mr.T:

       

This was to be expected. They did not learn from the mistakes of the Babylonians.

Is this jealousy or you expressing your dislike for the Saudis? There are risk involved in every kind of constructions. I don't believe the pilgrims prayed for this to happen.

Cobra you keeping T on his toes.

Chief
Originally Posted by Cobra:
Originally Posted by Mr.T:

       

This was to be expected. They did not learn from the mistakes of the Babylonians.

Is this jealousy or you expressing your dislike for the Saudis? There are risk involved in every kind of constructions. I don't believe the pilgrims prayed for this to happen.

Tbagger is certainly missing some vital brain cells.

FM
Originally Posted by Chief:
Originally Posted by cain:

I feel for those who were injured or killed.

 

This is supposed to be such a holy place you mean the man upstairs or wherever the rass he resides, couldn't look out for his people?

 

This is the stuff that proves to me there aint no dam God.

 

 

Pot mess up your brains!

Why Kaz, because I feel for those injured and killed? Gotta be that.

cain
Originally Posted by cain:
Originally Posted by Chief:
Originally Posted by cain:

I feel for those who were injured or killed.

 

This is supposed to be such a holy place you mean the man upstairs or wherever the rass he resides, couldn't look out for his people?

 

This is the stuff that proves to me there aint no dam God.

 

 

Pot mess up your brains!

Why Kaz, because I feel for those injured and killed? Gotta be that.

Bai,  yuh rass addressing de wrong person. That was the Chief.

FM
Originally Posted by Chief:
Originally Posted by cain:

I feel for those who were injured or killed.

 

This is supposed to be such a holy place you mean the man upstairs or wherever the rass he resides, couldn't look out for his people?

 

This is the stuff that proves to me there aint no dam God.

 

 

Pot mess up your brains!

Nothing more disturbing to brain chemistry than ideological delusional religious fluff. If god exists then  so do  unicorns since both have equal chance to be true.

FM

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