Teaching resource launched to share lessons of Piper Alpha tragedy An online resource to teach children about the Piper Alpha disaster has been launched 25 years after the world's worst offshore platform disaster. First Minister Alex Salmond unveiled the Piper Alpha learning community, where teachers can share ideas and discuss approaches to using the disaster in lessons. Mr Salmond said Scotland had an "obligation" to ensure there was never any repeat of the devastating fire which took the lives of 167 people. The site, accessed via the teachers' intranet, includes interviews with survivors, news reports and excerpts from the documentary Fire In The Night. The First Minister said: "No Scot who is old enough will ever forget hearing the news and seeing the horrifying images from that night in July 1988. Almost 25 years on, our first obligation to the men who died in the Piper Alpha tragedy remains ensuring a disaster like this is never allowed to happen again. Safety in the oil and gas industry has improved massively since the recommendations made in the Cullen report, but we owe it to the memory of those who were lost to continue to make safety absolutely the first priority for workers offshore. The 25th anniversary has rightly had a substantial emphasis in making sure that the new generation of offshore workers understand the importance of Piper Alpha in creating the current offshore safety regime. However, given that the oil industry will be with us for the next half century and more, we also have a responsibility to ensure that new generations of Scots understand the significance of the world's worst offshore disaster. On Saturday the First Minister will attend the remembrance and rededication service at the North Sea Memorial in Aberdeen's Hazlehead Park, where the Scottish Government has donated £100,000 for the restoration and maintenance of the garden.