An unusual heavy rainfall occurred Saturday afternoon at mount Arafat, outskirts of Makkah in Saudi Arabia where about 1.8 million pilgrims gathered to seek for Allah’s forgiveness, which is one of the rituals of Hajj exercise.
The rain started around 2:30pm local time, about an hour after the pilgrims have prayed a combined shortened two units prayer for Zuhr and Asr respectively.
The heavy downpour was unexpected, as it was a rare occurrence during the five-day Hajj rituals in Saudi Arabia.
The temperature in Makkah and other Hajj cities rose to over 40° Celsius during the day time.
Our correspondent gathered that for a long time, such incident was not recorded on the day of Arafat or any of the major Hajj rituals.
Some of the tents used by pilgrims from Nigeria and other countries around the world were affected, but as at the time of filing this report, no injury had been recorded.
However, the rainfall has caused a power outage at the temporary camps used by the pilgrims.
The pilgrims will leave Arafat after sunset to Muzdalifat where they will spend the night and collect pebbles for stoning the devil on Sunday (Tomorrow), which is the 10th of Zhul Hajj, the 12th month of the Islamic Calendar.
Pilgrims are expected to spend the next three days between Mina and Muzdalifat to stone the three Jamratsz each symbolizing stoning the devil.
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