Heavens open as 2.5 million pilgrims begin hajj

Day-long downpour starts annual hajj as thousands of people walk from Mecca to Mina.

MECCA - A day-long downpour started the annual hajj on Wednesday, as thousands of people walked from Mecca to Mina.

Some of the 2.5 million Muslims on the world's largest annual pilgrimage said they would skip the traditional overnight stay in Mina valley because the rain had bottled up bus transport from Mecca.

Instead they planned to stay in the holy city and travel on Thursday morning directly to Mount Arafat, where the Prophet Mohammed gave his last sermon and where pilgrims are required to recite the holy Koran and pray.

"We delayed going to Mina because of the heavy rain in Mecca. We were afraid of becoming sick," said Iraqi Iyad Badawi, 40, undertaking the hajj with his wife. "We will go to Arafat directly after midnight" by bus, he said.

A sea of pilgrims from all over the world, dressed in white robes and towels, began the five-day hajj late on Tuesday and early on Wednesday, circling the Kaaba inside Mecca's Grand Mosque.

Few people appeared concerned over swine flu.

Four pilgrims had died from the disease before the rites officially began. Saudi health officials said that all four had already been suffering from other health problems, one from cancer and another from heart disease.

Proven and suspected infections from the A(H1N1) flu among hajj participants were just 67, health ministry spokesman Dr Khaled Marghlani said on Wednesday. "Everything is going smoothly, thanks to God," he said.

Swine flu has killed some 6,750 people around the world this year, the World Health Organization said on Friday, and Saudi authorities have deployed as many as 20,000 health workers.

Marghlani said the rain could increase health risks for pilgrims, but that the authorities had "planned for this possibility."

Ceremonies begin with the "tawaf," circling seven times the cubic Kaaba building in the center of the massive, one-million-person capacity Grand Mosque, in whose direction all Muslims around the world pray.

The next stage is the overnight stay at Mina before climbing Mount Arafat.

On Wednesday afternoon, thousands of people plodded through the rain on the eight-kilometer (five-mile) trek to Mina, as others tried to go by bus.

The Saudis were expecting about two million foreigners this year for the hajj. But the number of pilgrims from inside the kingdom, estimated at near one million last year, was expected to be down because of swine flu fears.

Source: Middle East Online.
Link: http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=35921.