Six people died and eight were injured after a fire and explosion at a restaurant in the Czech city of Most during the night of January 11-12, 2025, emergency services said. Thirty people were evacuated from the restaurant and nearby area as 12 firefighting units responded.
The fire brigade said a propane-butane cylinder exploded at the Kojot restaurant. Based on initial witness information, officials believed a heater had overturned and started a fire before the blast. That was an early assessment rather than a completed investigative finding.
Emergency crews took the eight injured people to hospital. Firefighters also rescued one patron who had become trapped in a restaurant toilet. Czech Radio reported that about 20 guests were inside the establishment at the time, according to DW's account. The available evidence does not provide the victims' identities or detailed medical conditions.
Firefighters brought the blaze under control shortly after 1 a.m. local time on Sunday, public broadcaster CT24 reported, citing fire brigade spokesperson Petr Pelikus. Images published by Czech media showed extensive destruction at the restaurant. Most is roughly 70 kilometers northwest of Prague, near the Czech border with the German state of Saxony.
Police opened an investigation into possible negligent endangerment of public safety. That inquiry was responsible for determining how the heater fell, whether the cylinder and heating equipment were being used correctly, and whether any safety failures contributed. None of those questions was resolved in the supplied report.
Interior Minister Vít Rakušan expressed condolences to those affected and wished the injured a quick recovery. He also met municipal and regional officials to discuss the investigation. The response combined firefighting and medical work at the scene with a subsequent police examination of possible negligence.
The initial source information differs from the discovery note on the number of injured people: the fire brigade account carried by DW says eight, not 11. This report follows the documented emergency-service figure. Likewise, it describes an overturned heater as the likely initiating event because that is how firefighters presented the early witness information, without treating it as a proven final cause.
By the end of the emergency response, authorities had confirmed six deaths, transferred eight injured people for treatment and evacuated 30 people. The fire itself was under control, but the human toll and destruction had made it one of the city's most serious recent emergencies. The police inquiry then became the mechanism for separating the initial witness account from a formal explanation of how a restaurant heating device and fuel cylinder led to the fatal blast.
