Close to death in the Crans-Montana fire, this 19-year-old French boy with 30% burns recounts the night of the tragedy in his book “A second to be reborn”

On January 1, 2026, the party turned into a nightmare in Crans-Montana. A fire in the Le Constellation bar-nightclub in Switzerland left 41 dead and more than 100 injured. Among the survivors, Tahirys Dos Santos and his partner.

Burned on around 30% of his body, affected in the face, arms and torso, the young 19-year-old defender was hospitalized for many weeks before beginning extensive rehabilitation. He then recounts the night when everything changed and his long road to reconstruction in a book co-written with journalist Arnaud Ramsay, published on May 7.

“How to come back to life?”

In this testimony, Tahirys Dos Santos returns to the precise moment when everything changed, but also to the panic, the pain and the survival instinct. The work also describes the reconstruction, physical and mental, of a young player who questions his future: “how to continue to live, to play, to move forward when the body is forever marked?”

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VIDEO. Crans-Montana fire: two months after the tragedy, young footballer Tahirys Dos Santos reunites with his teammates from FC Metz

Despite the violence of the trauma, the Metz defender has already returned to the field. After 100 days off, he returned to training with the FC Metz reserve, even playing a few minutes in National 3. According to The Teamthe 19-year-old player should sign his first professional contract with his training club, FC Metz, which will make it official at the beginning of next week.

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Crans-Montana fire: “I had planned to propose to my girlfriend…” The confessions of Hugo Hare, a young 19-year-old footballer

A message of reconstruction

On the website of the Fnacwe can already read the synopsis: “December 31, 2025, Crans-Montana. What was supposed to be the perfect New Year’s Eve at Constellation descends into chaos in a few seconds. The bar-discotheque turns into a deadly inferno. In the midst of the panic and the flames, Tahirys has only one thought: to find his girlfriend and escape from this hell. They both come out seriously burned, but alive. At 19 years old, Tahirys recounts the unthinkable: the night when everything changed, then the long struggle to rebuild oneself when one’s footballer’s body is forever scarred? A poignant story about refusing fate and the power of resilience.