Six Britons died after a minibus crashed while carrying a group of relatives and friends on pilgrimage to Mecca.
A newborn baby and three other members of the same family from Manchester were among those killed when the vehicle’s tyre burst as they travelled along a motorway in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday, according to The Times.
Six others on board are believed to have survived, some of whom remain critically injured at King Fahd hospital in Medina.
The group had just completed Umrah, a pilgrimage to Mecca, and had travelled to Saudi Arabia the previous Thursday.
Mohammad Aslam, 73, and his wife, Talat Aslam, 62, who lived in Rutherglen, Glasgow, were killed in the crash.
They were close friends of the other victims – Rabia Ahmed, 57, her sister, Noshina Ahmed, 49, Noshina’s husband Khurshid Ahmed, 63, a taxi driver, and the Ahmeds’ grandson, Mohammad Adam Anis, who was two months old.
Noshina and Rabia’s other sisters, Fozia Akhter Zahid, 66, and Sadia Chaudhry, 63, were also in the vehicle with their friend, Nuzhat Niazi, 72.
“We are a very close-knit family,” Fozia’s daughter, Farah Zahid, told the Manchester Evening News. “Everyone is either in shock or completely heartbroken. We are very lucky that our family is well known in Manchester and Glasgow and that there has been a huge show of support from the community already.”