Italian golfer, 16, named as first victim of tragic Swiss ski resort bar fire

The first victim of a devastating fire in a Swiss ski resort bar has been named, as the painstaking identification process continues.

At least 40 people were killed and another 115 injured after a blaze engulfed the Crans-Montana resort’s Le Constellation bar shortly after midnight on Thursday. It has been described as one of Switzerland’s “worst tragedies”.

Emanuele Galeppini, a 16-year-old athlete who lived in Dubai, was staying in the Crans-Montana resort with his family. He went to the resort bar with two friends on New Year’s Eve, Italian media reported.

open image in gallery

In a statement, the Italian Golf Federation said it mourned the death of “a young athlete who embodied passion and authentic values”.

“In this time of great sorrow, our thoughts go out to his family and all those who loved him,” they said.

His page on the World Amateur Golf Ranking website described him as an Italian junior golfer who “loves to golf, compete and eat”.

Last year, he claimed the championship title at the Omega Dubai Creek Amateur Open.

The news came as authorities warned that identification of other victims could take days or even weeks due to the severe nature of the burns.

open image in gallery

The exact cause of the blaze is not yet known, but officials have ruled out an attack.

Two women told French broadcaster BFMTV they were inside when they saw a male bartender lifting a female bartender on his shoulders as she held a lit candle in a bottle. The flames spread, collapsing the wooden ceiling, they told the broadcaster.

Video footage appears to show the ceiling of the bar rapidly catching fire, though attorney general Beatrice Pilloud declined to confirm the reports in a press conference on Thursday afternoon.

One of the women described a crowd surge as people frantically tried to escape from a basement nightclub up a narrow flight of stairs and through a narrow door.

open image in gallery

The fire is said to have prompted an explosion, which officials described as an “embrasement” – a firefighting term describing how a blaze can trigger the release of combustible gases that can then ignite violently.

This causes what English-speaking firefighters would call a flashover or a backdraft – which is when all combustible materials in an enclosed space ignite at the same time, often engulfing a room.

A witness speaking to local media BFMTV described people smashing windows to escape the blaze, some gravely injured, and panicked parents rushing to the scene in cars to see whether their children were trapped inside.

The young man said he saw about 20 people scrambling to get out of the smoke and flames and likened what he saw to a horror movie as he watched from across the street.