Police control access to the street where a fire ripped through a crowded bar during New Year's Eve celebrations in the Alpine ski resort town of Crans-Montana on January 1, 2026. Photo: MAXIME SCHMID / AFP
Swiss local authorities have admitted that fire safety inspections had not been carried out for the past five years at a bar where 40 people died and dozens were injured in a New Year blaze.
"Periodic inspections were not conducted between 2020 and 2025. We bitterly regret this," Crans-Montana mayor Nicolas Feraud told a press conference in the Alpine ski resort, five days after the disaster at Le Constellation bar.
The authorities have said they believe the fire started when people celebrating New Year raised champagne bottles with sparklers attached, setting light to sound insulating foam on the ceiling of the bar's basement.
In a statement issued at the press conference, the Municipality of Crans-Montana said it had gone through all the documents in the file submitted to the Wallis canton public prosecutor's office following the fire.
It said the documents detail "administrative procedures relating to the establishment's compliance".
"Although more than 1400 fire inspections were carried out in the municipality in 2025 alone, the municipal council deeply regrets discovering that this establishment had failed to undergo periodic inspections between 2020 and 2025."
The council said it would commission a specialist external agency to inspect all public establishments and would ban pyrotechnic devices indoors.
"The Municipality of Crans-Montana remains fully committed to supporting the victims of this tragedy and their families and loved ones, who are constantly in its thoughts," the statement said.
"It will continue to do everything in its power to ensure that such a tragedy never happens again."
Wallis police said Monday it had identified all 116 people injured in the blaze, of whom 83 remained in hospital.
The average age of those killed was 19.
- AFP
