How the Swiss bar fire unfolded and what we know so far ...Middle East

A huge fire that broke out during New Year’s Eve celebrations in a Swiss ski resort has killed around 40 to 50 people and injured 115, according to police.

Many victims were young, with the first named victim of the blaze identified as an Italian teenage golfer. 

Now questions are being asked over how such a tragedy could have happened as people celebrated the start of 2026 at the Le Constellation, a bar in Crans-Montana.

Stephane Ganzer, head of safety for the canton of Valais, said: “The death toll is terrible and it could get worse.”

This is how the disaster unfolded.

Just before midnight, New Year’s Eve (11pm UK time):

The start of 2026 is being celebrated at Le Constellation, a bar which had a capacity of 300. It is not known how many people were in the venue on Thursday, which has a ground level and basement area, as well as a small outside terrace.

A previous promotional YouTube video from the club shows a dance floor area surrounding a central bar, with seating booths around the edge of the wood-panelled room.

It shows a scene similar to the celebrations that would have been played out on New Year’s Eve: There’s a DJ playing as colourful spotlights spin across the room. Neon signs advertising Dom Perignon Champagne are on the walls. Staff wearing lit-up motorbike helmets holding bottles of bubbles with sparklers in the bottle necks – a gimmick often enjoyed during parties in ski resorts. They hand the lit bottles to customers or put them into huge ice buckets. The video also shows staff walking around the club holding the lit bottles above their heads near the ceiling and carrying them in ice buckets on their shoulders.

Photos taken on New Year’s Eve, not verified by this paper but published by French media, show the bar was packed with people dancing and multiple lit bottles being passed around. One photo shows a woman on the shoulders of another man as both carry lit bottles.

Shortly before 1.30am, New Year’s Day:

Multiple eyewitnesses told journalists that they saw a waiter holding a lit sparkler in a champagne bottle. Their account echoed what was seen in the photos shared with French media, and said they saw a bartender lifting a colleague with the lit drink on his shoulders – but this time the sparks from the candle caught on the ceiling and began to spread.

“One of the candles was held too close to the ceiling, which caught fire. In a matter of seconds, the entire ceiling was ablaze. Everything was made of wood,” two women told French media outlet BFMTV.

Photos posted to review website Tripadvisor show the basement club’s ceiling has foam panels and metal tubes running across it.

Around 1.30 am:

Smoke was first seen coming from the bar indicating the fire began around this time.

Footage shows the ceiling on fire, with pieces of what appear to be burning foam dropping onto the floor. One clip shows a man trying to put the fire out by attempting to smother it with a jumper. The fire appears to have started in the area behind the central bar and on the opposite side of the room from the only exit.

As the fire broke out, which was initially reported as an explosion, people tried to escape from the basement up a narrow flight of stairs. An image of these stairs can be seen on Tripadvisor: The stairs, which are also wooden, appear wide enough for only one or two people to pass on at once. The entrance to the stairs is highlighted with a fire exit sign.

The fire appears to have spread quickly, with another video from the scene showing a large part of the bar on fire while patrons still inside and many trying to push up the stairs. The blaze could later be seen through the upstairs windows.

One eyewitness said the compact space and panic resulted in a crush of people trying to all pass through at once.

Once upstairs, the crowd began to try to smash through windows in order to escape outside.

Victoria, one of the survivors, told BFMTV she believes many of the victims may have suffocated. She said: “It was firework candles inside a champagne bottle that caused the explosion. The entire ceiling of the bar caught fire.

“All the windows were black and opaque with smoke… Some people smashed windows to let in air,” she said. “I’m still shaking; many were crying as they left. It was mass panic.”

Tim Steffens, 19, told the same French news channel: “Everyone was pushing and shoving their way out of the stairwell… It was awful. They were all burned. Their clothes were burned away.”

Emergency services began receiving calls within seconds of the smoke being seen.

1.32 am:

The first police officers arrived, and were followed by rescue teams.

Thirteen helicopters, 42 ambulances, 150 paramedics and 70 firefighters rushed to the scene, according to the BBC.

The aftermath:

As dawn broke, photos from the scene show broken windows at Le Constellation. Emergency services have covered the building in protective sheets.

Those in the area have been leaving tributes of flowers and messages at the scene, trying to take in what has happened.

An investigation is now underway, with the region’s chief-prosecutor Beatrice Pilloud saying there will be an examination as to whether the staircases were in line with building regulations. Pilloud added there was no reason to suggest the fire was any kind of attack.

A number of the injured victims have been transported to hospitals across Switzerland, with 22 people, mostly aged 16-25, rushed to Lausanne University Hospital. An Italian woman in her twenties and two boys under 16 were taken to a major burns unit in Milan.

The first named victim of the fire, Emanuele Galeppini, was a young Italian golfer.

Around 30 victims are Italian nationals, with the Italian Foreign Ministry telling the BBC that 16 of their people are currently missing, and around 15 others are receiving hospital treatment.

Eight French citizens are missing, with French media reporting two more are injured. FC Metz, a French football club, said one of its youth players, Tahirys Dos Santos, 19, was “severely burned” in the fire.

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The true number of those who lost their lives during what should have been a night of celebration will only become clear in the coming days, with the Swiss authorities saying around 40 have died and that some of the victims’ burns are so severe it will take a number of days before everyone is identified. Meanwhile, the Italian government has placed the number of the dead closer to 47 victims, with five people yet to be identified.

Switzerland’s President Guy Parmelin said the fire is “one of the worst tragedies that our country has experienced”.

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