The KSA Ministry of Hajj and Umrah (MOHU) has shared that the end-to-end management of Hajj pilgrims for 2022 includes the use of new technologies, including field surveillance cameras, smartphone apps, performance dashboards and a smart Hajj platform. Data captured through the various channels is used to finetune operations.
Crowd control was successfully supplemented by surveillance cameras at the holy sites, leading to pilgrims being guided to the Jamarat site on the 1st day of Tashreeq, the 2nd day of Eid al-Adha (11 July 2022), without incident*.
rly, the routing of pilgrims was completed on time and without any conflicts as they went from Jamarat al-Soghra to Jamarat al-Wusta, and then to Jamarat al-Aqaba. The routes are complex as there are four storeys on a pedestrian bridge from which to access the Jamarat towers. Other strategies to enhance the ease of the ritual included requesting pilgrims from carrying personal belongings during the Jamarat ritual, and requiring a regiment leader for every 90 pilgrims.
Crowd control was also in place from 12 Dhulhijjah to enable pilgrims to perform the farewell Tawaf, or circumnambulation of the Ka'abah, one of the last rituals of the Hajj.
MOHU separately reported that its Communication Center has fielded more than 222,000 phone calls as well as enquiries via e-mail and through Twitter for the Hajj season to date. A toll-free hotline answered about 3,000 calls per day, the majority of which were questions about how to obtain visas, applying for Hajj, how to benefit from the Eatmarna app, and technical support. Some 3,600 e-mails were answered during the same period. The @MOHU_Care Twitter account responded to more than 1,290 tweets and messages as well.
*Eid al-Adha occurs on the 10th of the month Dhulhijjah. One of the key Hajj rituals, the stoning of the devil, takes place at three towers at Jamarat in the city of Mina on the 2nd day of Eid al-Adha, 11 Dhulhijjah. The 11th to 13th of Dhulhijjah are called Tashreeq days, and come with specific rituals which are permitted or forbidden.