{"id":46462,"date":"2026-01-02T06:01:01","date_gmt":"2026-01-02T06:01:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/?p=46462"},"modified":"2026-01-02T06:01:01","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T06:01:01","slug":"swiss-fire-victim-identification-processes-underway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/2026\/01\/02\/swiss-fire-victim-identification-processes-underway\/","title":{"rendered":"Swiss fire victim identification processes underway &#8211; SABC News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <script data-jetpack-boost=\"ignore\" async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-1669381584671856\"\r\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script>\r\n<!-- Africa tv video display -->\r\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\r\n     style=\"display:block\"\r\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-1669381584671856\"\r\n     data-ad-slot=\"3579572842\"\r\n     data-ad-format=\"auto\"\r\n     data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins>\r\n<script data-jetpack-boost=\"ignore\">\r\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\r\n<\/script><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"paragraph-0\">\n<p>Investigators, on Friday set about the painful task of identifying the burned bodies of a blaze that engulfed a crowded bar and killed around 40 people at a New Year\u2019s Eve party in the upscale Swiss ski resort of Crans-Montana.<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"paragraph-0\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">WATCH | Swiss police report that around 40 people have died in a fire that swept through a bar at a ski resort in the country\u2019s south, with another 115 injured. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/PSMJiPqQve\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/PSMJiPqQve<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 SABC News (@SABCNews) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SABCNews\/status\/2006961082171089377?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">January 2, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"text-module__text__0GDob text-module__dark-grey__UFC18 text-module__regular__qJJtA text-module__small__sph8i body-module__full_width__kCIGb body-module__small_body__gOmDf article-body-module__paragraph__Ts-yF\" data-testid=\"paragraph-1\">So severe were the burns suffered by the mostly young crowd of revellers in the Le Constellation bar that Swiss officials said it could take days before they name all the victims of the fire that also injured 115, many of them seriously.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"paragraph-1\">\n<p>Parents of missing youths anxiously 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.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe first objective is to assign names to all the bodies,\u201d Crans-Montana\u2019s mayor Nicolas Feraud told a press conference on Thursday evening. This, he said, could take days. Mathias Reynard, head of government of the canton of Valais, said experts were using dental and DNA samples for the task.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAll this work needs to be done because the information is so terrible and sensitive that nothing can be told to the families unless we are 100 percent sure,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"paragraph-7\">\n<p>Residents of Crans-Montana, which has the distinction of being not only a popular draw for skiers but also golfers, were stunned by the inferno. Many knew victims and some said they were lucky not to have been there themselves.<\/p>\n<p>Hundreds of people stood in silence near the scene as they came to pay their respects to the victims on Thursday night.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou think you\u2019re safe here, but this can happen anywhere. They were people like us,\u201d says Piermarco Pani, an 18-year-old who, like many others in the town, knew the bar well.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div data-testid=\"paragraph-10\">\n<p>Dozens of people left flowers or lit candles on a makeshift altar at the top of the road leading to the bar, which police had cordoned off. Some cried, others quietly hugged one another. Behind the cordon, the bodies of some victims still lay in the bar, police said, as they pledged to work around the clock to identify everyone who succumbed to the blaze.<\/p>\n<p>Kean Sarbach, 17, says he had spoken to four people who escaped from the bar, some with burns, and that they had told him the flames had spread very quickly.<\/p>\n<p>Elisa Sousa, 17, said she was meant to be there but ended up spending the evening at a family gathering instead.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd honestly, I\u2019ll need to thank my mother a hundred times for not letting me go,\u201d she said at the vigil for the victims. \u201cBecause God knows where I\u2019d be now,\u201d adds Sousa.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script data-jetpack-boost=\"ignore\" async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-1669381584671856\"\r\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script>\r\n<!-- Africa tv video display -->\r\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\r\n     style=\"display:block\"\r\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-1669381584671856\"\r\n     data-ad-slot=\"3579572842\"\r\n     data-ad-format=\"auto\"\r\n     data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins>\r\n<script data-jetpack-boost=\"ignore\">\r\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\r\n<\/script><br \/>\n#Swiss #fire #victim #identification #processes #underway #SABC #News<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Investigators, on Friday set about the painful task of identifying the burned bodies of a blaze that engulfed a crowded&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46463,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mzansi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46462"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46462\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46464,"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46462\/revisions\/46464"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eduzim.co.zw\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}