Swiss Authorities Admit Lapses in Fire Inspections Ahead of Deadly Inferno

Swiss officials have admitted that fire safety inspections had not been conducted for the past five years at a bar where 40 people died in a New Year’s Eve blaze, authorities said Tuesday.

The fire at Le Constellation, located in the Crans-Montana ski resort in southwestern Switzerland, also left 116 people injured, with 83 still receiving treatment in hospitals. Most of the victims were teenagers.

Prosecutors believe the blaze started when revelers attached sparklers to champagne bottles, igniting sound-insulating foam on the ceiling of the bar’s basement.

Although inspections, including fire safety checks, were conducted in 2016, 2018, and 2019, “periodic inspections were not carried out between 2020 and 2025. We bitterly regret this,” Crans-Montana Mayor Nicolas Feraud said during a press conference five days after the disaster.

Swiss law mandates annual inspections of public establishments by the municipal fire department, but Feraud admitted he did not know why the checks were missed in recent years.

The municipality said the failure came to light after reviewing documents submitted to the Wallis canton prosecutor’s office. “The courts will determine the influence that this lapse had in the chain of events leading to the tragedy. The municipality will assume full responsibility as determined by the courts,” it said in a statement.

To prevent future disasters, the council announced it would hire an external agency to inspect all public venues and would ban pyrotechnic devices indoors.

“The municipality of Crans-Montana remains fully committed to supporting the victims, their families, and loved ones, who are constantly in our thoughts,” the statement added. “We will continue to do everything in our power to ensure such a tragedy never happens again.”