The investigation and the process of identifying the victims continue today following the fire at a bar in the Swiss ski resort of Crans-Montana on New Year’s night, which caused at least 40 deaths and 115 injuries, according to the head of police of the canton where it occurred.

Various resources have been mobilized “to identify the victims and hand over the bodies to their families as quickly as possible,” said Béatrice Piguet, the chief prosecutor of the canton of Valais, in southwestern Switzerland. “This work may continue for several more days,” noted the head of cantonal police, Frédéric Gissler.

“We are trying to contact our friends (…) On Instagram, on Facebook, on all social networks,” said Eleanor, 17, anxiously. “But nothing. No response. We called the parents. Nothing. Not even the parents know.”

The fire broke out around 1:30 a.m. (local time; 2:30 a.m. Greece time) on Thursday inside the packed Le Constellation bar in Crans-Montana, where tourists—among them many young people—had gone to celebrate New Year’s Eve, according to the authorities of the canton of Valais.

Eyewitnesses described horrific scenes. People tried to break windows to escape; others, with their bodies burned, were running to get outside.

“We have counted around forty deceased and about 115 injured, the majority of them seriously,” Mr. Gissler, the head of the cantonal police, said yesterday.

Last night, hundreds of people gathered silently, defying the polar cold, in front of the bar to pay tribute to the victims.

The flags at the Swiss Federal Palace will fly at half-mast for five days, Swiss Confederation President Guy Parmelin announced yesterday.

Two young French women who said they were inside the bar told the French television network BFM TV that they saw the fire start in the club’s basement after some people were holding a bottle with fireworks very close to the wooden ceiling.

“The fire spread very quickly across the ceiling,” one of the women told BFM TV. They also recounted that they managed to climb a narrow staircase to the ground floor and leave the building. Minutes later, the ground floor had also been engulfed in flames, they said.

BFM broadcast a video showing a waiter carrying a bottle of champagne with a lit “sparkler candle” into the bar, in line with the testimonies, but the video does not show a fire breaking out.

Scenes of absolute chaos

As the hours pass, more and more testimonies from patrons and passersby in Crans-Montana are circulating in Swiss and German media. Nineteen-year-old ski instructor Tim Stephens was just outside the bar when the fire broke out. Speaking to the Swiss outlet 20 Minutes, he said: “People rushed to the stairs to get out. It was bad. Everyone burned. Their clothes destroyed by fire. It was not nice at all. The screams… not nice at all, not nice at all!”

Another young eyewitness told the newspaper Tagesanzeiger that the area around the bar looked like a “war zone” and described “thick, black smoke coming out of the bar, people on fire, dead bodies on the floor. An apocalyptic landscape.”

Locals and tourists report that in Crans-Montana the New Year’s celebration begins with a large outdoor party: everyone is outside, the streets are full, as are the shops. It was within this setting that the fire broke out.

Fire safety system under scrutiny

As noted by the newspaper Bild, after the first shocking images circulated online and in the media, many questions are now being raised about the safety standards of the specific establishment.

A bar patron told the newspaper Blick that there was only one emergency exit in the basement and that the exit was completely overcrowded. He also said that in the past—specifically two years ago—he had wondered what would happen in a panic situation in that particular basement.

According to Bild, in Switzerland strict fire safety rules are defined by specific guidelines set by the cantons. For gathering spaces of this size, meaning entertainment venues for more than 100 people, extremely strict rules apply.

For example, there must be at least two independent emergency exits leading directly outdoors or to staircases. Only one emergency exit, as in this bar, can easily turn into a “death trap” in the event of an explosion or suffocating smoke.