Pilgrims move in circles around the holy Kaaba from the third floor at the Grand Mosque ahead of the annual Haj pilgrimage in Makkah on Monday. A fire temporarily forced out some 1,500 pilgrims out of their hotel early Monday.

Four Yemeni pilgrims sustained minor injuries as a result of a fire that broke out in their room at 11th floor of a 15-floor hotel in Makkah.

Col. Abdullah Al-Orabi Al-Harathi, director of media and spokesman of Civil Defense, said the incident occurred at 2:45 a.m. Monday.

Al-Harathi said some 1,500 pilgrims are the hotel were evacuated as a precautionary measure, but were later allowed to return after Civil Defense teams put out the fire.

Initial inspections showed that the fire was caused by a short-circuit in one of electrical connections of a room.

On Thursday about 1,000 Asian pilgrims were evacuated from their high-rise hotel in Makkah when a fire broke out. Two Indonesian pilgrims were injured.

The Haj has been almost incident-free for the past decade but 108 people, including foreign pilgrims, died earlier this month when a construction crane fell on the circumambulation area of the Grand Mosque.

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