two dead hamsters

Question
My son and I cleaned out his two hamster cages yesterday.  We cleaned out the cages outside since it was warm and the glass cages would dry quicker.  After getting the bedding set up we put the hamsters in their cages (these are dwarf hamsters) and they ran around a bit.  We then carried them inside.  After about two hours, one of them was dead and two hours after that the other one died as well.

Could they have gotten overheated and dehydrated being outside that short time?  I didn't think they were outside that long, but maybe they were.  The older of the two died first and was very lethargic when we brought it back in the house.  The younger one was very active in the cage when we brought it in, but died almost very suddenly.  What do you think?

Answer
Hello. I am so sorry the two hamsters died. It does seem like they were overheated in the tanks being outside. It can get extremely hot in glass cages for hamsters if they are left outside. I really do think that they died because they just got so hot from being outside. What type of bedding did you use? Ceder and pine causes liver and lung disease in animals, but my guess is that since they both died only a few hours after they were brought inside it was probably the heat that did it.