A SCOTTISH fire brigade tried to persuade residents to check their smoke alarms – by invoking the spirit of Stalin.
Tayside Fire and Rescue tweeted followers on Tuesday: “On this day in 1953, Joseph Stalin died, sure he would have tested his smoke alarm first, have you?”
Scott Symon, Tayside’s station manager responsible for risk information, explained: “We looked through this day in history to find something else that happened on March 5.
“The most prominent event seemed to be the death of Stalin, so it was added in.”
The tweet was sent as part of Scottish fire brigades’ Test it Tuesday initiative.
But Stalin’s suitability as a health and safety role model is likely to be questioned in some quarters.
Under his regime, an estimated 20 million Soviet citizens died as a result of famine, forced labour or execution.
