At the Hajj House in Nampally in Hyderabad, grief hung heavy in the air on Monday (November 17, 2025) afternoon. In the open, muddy courtyard, families clutched documents, photographs and each other, waiting for any word on their loved ones who died in the tragic bus crash in Saudi Arabia earlier in the morning.
Among them was Syed from Ramnagar, trembling as he spoke, still unable to process the scale of his loss. “I told them not to go together. Not to take all the children; at least some members of the family would have survived,” he said, breaking down mid-sentence. In one night, 18 members of his family, spanning three generations, were gone. His elder sister, her three daughters, a son, and her grandchildren, all of whom had travelled together for Umrah, did not make it back. The deceased included nine children.
Saudi Arabia bus accident: 18 members of a Hyderabad family killed; 5 from another family
Only one person from that branch of the family survives: the elder son, who is currently in the United States. “He wanted to join them too,” said another relative. “He only stayed behind because he couldn’t get a ticket. His wife and two children went… and they didn’t survive.”
The family had begun their pilgrimage on November 9. After spending a week in Mecca, they were heading to Medina when their bus collided with a diesel tanker in the early hours of Monday. Syed had spoken to them just hours earlier on Sunday night. “They said everything was fine… they were going to start their journey,” he recalled. By 4 a.m. IST, came the crushing news of the crash.
