Six people injured in the fatal fire at a Swiss bar remain unidentified. It’s an unbearable wait
CRANS-MONTANA, Switzerland (AP) — Sixteen-year-old Arthur Brodard Le Constellation bar With friends to celebrate the new year. Almost 48 hours after a devastating fire, his mother still held out hope that he might be one of six unidentified casualties following one of Switzerland’s worst tragedies.
These half-dozen people gave a glimmer of hope to families who lost loved ones after the fire in the Alpine ski resort of Crans-Montana that killed 40 people and injured 119, 113 of whom have been officially identified.
“I’m looking everywhere. My son’s body is somewhere,” Laetitia Brodard from Lausanne, Switzerland, told reporters. “I want to know where my child is, I want to be with him. No matter where he is, whether in intensive care or in the morgue.”
The severity of the burns made it difficult to identify both the injured and the dead, requiring families to provide DNA samples to authorities. In some cases, wallets and the identification documents inside were reduced to ashes in the flames. An Instagram account was flooded with photos of unnamed people, with friends and relatives begging for clues as to their whereabouts.
Officials in the Valais regional government acknowledged the lingering heartache.
“You will understand that today the priority is really given to identification, to allow the families to begin to grieve,” Beatrice Pilloud, chief prosecutor for the Valais region, told reporters at a news conference on Friday.
Mathias Reynard, head of the regional government, added: “We are aware of the especially difficult hours, of the unbearable side of every unanswered minute.”
‘You can’t imagine the pain I’ve seen’
Investigators said Friday they believe bright candles on champagne bottles sparked the fire. deadly fire Two hours after midnight Thursday, when they got very close to the ceiling of the bar filled with New Year’s Eve revelers.
“We were taking people out, people were falling to the ground. We were doing everything we could to save them, we helped as much as we could, we saw people screaming, running,” 14-year-old Marc-Antoine Chavanon told The Associated Press in Crans-Montana on Friday, describing how he ran to the bar to help the injured. “We had a friend: He was having trouble getting out, he was burned. You can’t imagine the pain I saw.”
Most of the injured were in their teens to mid-20s, police said. Authorities planned to investigate whether the soundproofing material on the ceiling met regulations and whether candles were allowed in the bar.
Officials said they will also look at other security measures at the facility, including fire extinguishers and escape routes. The district attorney warned of possible investigations if any criminal liability is found.
Injuries poured in from all over Europe
According to Frédéric Gisler, police commander of the Valais region, the injured included 71 Swiss citizens, 14 French and 11 Italians, as well as citizens of Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Luxembourg, Belgium, Portugal and Poland. The nationality of 14 people is not yet clear.
Promising Italian golfer Emanuele Galeppini, who competes internationally, has officially been listed among Italy’s missing citizens. While his uncle, Sebastiano Galeppini, told the Italian news agency ANSA that his family was waiting for DNA tests, the Italian Golf Federation announced Galeppini’s death on its website.
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Dazio reported from Berlin. Associated Press journalists Geir Moulson in Berlin, Graham Dunbar in Geneva, and Nicole Winfield and Giada Zampano in Rome contributed to this report.
