A senior police official who reportedly remained comatose following a helicopter crash in March this year in Laguna has died and will be accorded with full honors, the Philippine National Police (PNP) announced on Tuesday.
Maj. Gen. Jose Victor Ramos, former director for comptrollership of the PNP, died at past midnight on Monday, PNP chief Gen. Camilo Pancratius Cascolan confirmed in a news statement released by spokesman Col. Ysmael Yu.
“On behalf of the Philippine Military Academy ‘Sinagtala’ Class 1986, it is with a heavy heart that I join the officers and personnel of the Philippine National Police in prayer and mourning over the passing of Police Major General Jose Victor Ramos at 12:07 A.M. today,” Cascolan said in the same statement.
The PNP chief said Ramos died “after a long hard battle due to serious injuries he sustained during that fateful helicopter accident in San Pedro, Laguna on March 5, 2020.”
“He will be accorded full honors befitting a police general,” Cascolan said of Ramos whose body was cremated.
Ramos’s official date of retirement is on November 25, 2020, according to Yu in a separate message to Camp Crame-based reporters.
“As chairman of the PNP Bids and Awards Committee and Director, he was instrumental in the speedy and transparent procurement of various equipment and essentials for the PNP as well as the immediate downloading of funds needed by our personnel on the ground,” Yu added.
A helicopter owned by the PNP bearing Ramos and seven others, including retired General Archie Gamboa, the PNP chief at that time, was taking off in San Pedro, Laguna in March when it figured in a freak accident.
The Bell 429 was lifting off from the ground amid an almost zero visibility due to a dust swirl when it touched a high-tension wire, forcing it to crash land, injuring Ramos, Gamboa and other officials, including former PNP Director for Intelligence Maj. Gen. Mariel Magaway and former PNP spokesman Brig. Gen. Bernard Banac.
Of the officials that were injured, it was Ramos and Magaway who sustained the most serious injuries.
Following the crash, the PNP grounded all of its helicopters as it tasked Lt. Gen. Guillermo Eleazar to investigate the incident.
Releasing the investigation’s findings, Yu said that the crash was borne by the lapses of the pilot, and that the Bell 429 was “airworthy” and has “no trouble” in both of its engines.
“The pilot-in-command failed to conduct risk assessment before the takeoff which is required for a trained pilot like him,” he said. “That there was lack of situational awareness and evaluation of surroundings which are part of the protocol for safe and proper take off.”
“That there were some lapses in judgment on the part of the pilot-in-command that include underestimating the capability of the aircraft,” the PNP spokesman said, citing the investigation report.