Fondue cooker blamed for Swiss Glacier 3000 eatery blaze

VD: Glacier 3000; fondue cooker at the origin of the fire Keystone-SDA

A fondue cooker is thought to have started a fire that devastated the Glacier 3000 restaurant in the Swiss Les Diablerets ski resort in 2022.

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The restaurant’s former catering manager will have to answer charges of negligence.

The woman in her 40s, who is presumed innocent, was summoned to appear before the Eastern Vaud Court in Vevey on November 10. The causes of the fire are reported in the indictment, which was published today by the French-language newspapers 24 heures and Le Temps.

The investigation, conducted by the School of Criminal Sciences (ESC) of the University of Lausanne, concluded that the cause of the fire was a stacked fondue cooker, one of which was still burning.

“The plastic tank located on the unlit cooker caught fire, then the fire spread to the cooker and combustible materials located nearby,” the Public Prosecutor’s Office wrote in its indictment.

The public prosecutor’s office in Vaud added that the instructions for using the cooker contained precisely an illustrated warning that it should never be stacked and the words ‘Caution, fire hazard due to synthetic material tank’.

Negligence charge

The staff member who stowed the cooker without turning it off was not prosecuted. The latter was neither “informed nor trained” on how to handle such appliances.

Instead, the Public Ministry charged the catering manager. At the time in charge of the restaurant’s operational management and staff, she allegedly did not “concern herself with the fate of these new devices”, which had been delivered a few weeks earlier. She therefore did not “inspect or instruct a subordinate to inspect” the instructions for using the new cookers.

The prosecutor in charge of the case considered that she had “neglected her duties of prudence with regard to supervision, instruction or delegation of tasks to her.” He therefore came to the conclusion that she may have been guilty of negligence.

Contacted by 24 heures and Le Temps, her lawyer would not answer at this stage of the investigation. The trial is set for November 10 and 11 in Vevey.

New restaurant

Located at the arrival of the Glacier 3000 cable car, the restaurant designed by star architect Mario Botta was largely destroyed during the night of September 18-19, 2022. The self-service restaurant on the third floor, the restaurant on the fourth and the lift machinery were completely devastated by the flames.

The cable car, on the other hand, remained intact. It should be noted that no employees were on site at the time of the fire.

A new restaurant, designed by Botta himself, was opened in November 2024. While the exterior of the building has remained virtually unchanged, the interior has been redesigned. The total cost of the reconstruction amounted to CHF30 million.

Translated from Italian by DeepL/mga

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