Hajj Stampede Near Mecca Leaves Over 700 Dead - The New York Times
▻http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/25/world/middleeast/mecca-stampede.html?_r=2
But some present in the area at the time said security forces had temporarily closed exits from an area packed with pilgrims, causing the crowding that led to the stampede.
Khalid Saleh, a Saudi government employee who rushed to the site when he heard screams and sirens, said he had found “huge numbers of people on the ground either dying or injured.” Pilgrims there told him that some of the area’s exits had been closed so that V.I.P. cars could pass, he said.