Dozens of young partygoers injured in a New Year’s Eve bar fire in Switzerland were transferred to specialist burn units across Europe as they fought for their lives yesterday after being hit by the devastating blaze, which has killed at least 40.
Initial findings showed the fire that spread among the mostly young crowd of revellers in Le Constellation bar in the Swiss ski resort of Crans-Montana was likely caused by sparkler candles being carried too close to the ceiling, the local prosecutor said.
Meanwhile, investigators focused on the painful task of identifying the burned bodies, warning that this process was very sensitive and would take time.
So severe were the burns that Swiss officials said it could take days before they name all those killed in the fire. The official toll is 40 dead, while 119 have been injured, many of them very seriously. Those numbers are not final, officials said.
“Many of those injured are still fighting for their lives today,” Valais area chief Mathias Reynard told a news conference.
Around 50 of the injured have been, or will be, transferred to burn units in hospitals elsewhere in Europe, he said.
Of the injured, 113 have been identified, 71 of whom are Swiss, 14 French and 11 Italian, police chief Frederic Gisler told the same news conference.
Initial investigations suggest that the fire which tore through the Swiss ski resort bar started when ‘fountain candles’ attached to champagne bottles were carried aloft too close to the ceiling, local prosecutor Beatrice Pilloud said.
“Everything suggests that the fire started from the burning candles or ‘Bengal lights’ that had been attached to champagne bottles,” she told the news conference, adding that, while this hypothesis was likely, it was not yet confirmed. “From there, a rapid, very rapid and widespread conflagration ensued.”
The investigation was also checking whether the ceiling’s insulation foam was to blame for the rapid spread of the fire, Pilloud said.
Further investigations will show if anyone needs to be held criminally liable for negligence, she added.
Emanuele Galeppini, a 16-year-old Italian international golfer who lived in Dubai, was the first victim to be identified publicly.
The Italian Golf Federation, which named the young Italian golfer as a victim, said it “mourns the passing of Emanuele Galeppini, a young athlete who carried with him passion and genuine values”.
Parents and friends of missing youths issued pleas for news of their loved ones as foreign embassies scrambled to work out if their nationals were among those caught up in one of the worst tragedies to befall modern Switzerland.
Laetitia Brodard-Sitre, the mother of 16-year-old Arthur, was looking for information near the site of the blaze.
“We are together, we are in shock, we take each other in our arms and we cry. We try to give each other hope,” she said of her relatives and others of those missing.
Marco, a 20-year-old from Milan, told Reuters outside the Constellation bar that 20 of his friends were missing.
“Some of them are injured, in bad condition. Some of them are completely safe. And some of our friends, we don’t have any news. They told us they never found them,” he said. “Nobody can help us find our friends.”
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani, who was in Switzerland, said that 13 Italians were in hospital and six registered as missing.
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