It is never easy for a mother to lose her child.
However, for Jacqueline Forbes, the mother of 17-year-old Ramone Forbes who died in a plane crash on Thursday, November 10, she is holding on to her faith in God. She is also surrounded by the memories of the son that she considers to be her best friend.
“When I ask him (Ramone) to anything he would do it… Ramone was so exceptional. He was my best friend,” Mrs Forbes said in an interview with The Times on Sunday.
She explained she had last seen Ramone on Sunday, November 6 and when he left their home at Castle district in Priestman’s River in Portland to Kingston to return to school, she never knew it would have been the last.
“He hugged me and squeezed me that Sunday evening and said ‘I love you.’ And that was the last time I saw him,” Mrs Forbes recollected, while adding that her son had always wanted to become a pilot.
Forbes graduated from Titchfield High School and went after his dream by enrolling at the Caribbean Aviation Training Centre, for a year. In late August of this year, he started school at Mico University College to pursue a degree in Computer Science.
According to Mrs Forbes, her son took this step as he needed a degree to be an airplane pilot. However, Forbes continued to do his hours at the Caribbean Aviation Training Centre in a quest to achieve his dreams.
However, tragedy would end the dream of young Forbes and two others.
PLANE CRASH
Forbes was one of three persons aboard a Cessna 172 aircraft, which crashed shortly after take-off from Tinson Pen Aerodrome into a house in Greenwich Town, Kingston last Thursday at around 1:30 p.m. The plane had developed mechanical difficulties.
Those who died on spot were fight instructor, 31-year-old Jonathan Worton of Boone Hall Road, Stony Hill in St Andrew and trainee pilot, 19-year-old Dansheer Gilmore of Ocean Hill, St Ann.
Forbes was pulled from the crash debris by residents and was rushed to the Kingston Public Hospital (KPH). He had burns covering 60 per cent of his body and he suffered from bone fractures, eye trauma and smoke inhalation.
However, the young boy, who was on the path of becoming one of Portland’s success stories, succumbed to his injuries at around 10 p.m. at KPH, according to a release form the Constabulary Communications Unit (CCU).
FOUGHT TO THE END
Mrs Forbes explained that what she was happy about was that she got the chance to see her son’s body at the hospital.
“I remember a doctor say, ‘Mother you have a strong boy. He fought to the end.’ And I hugged his body,” she painfully recollected, while adding that she will not question God as he had his reason for what happened.
She added that she was thankful for the 17 years she had with her son. Young Forbes would have celebrated his eighteenth birthday on Sunday, November 20.
“Sometime you see him (Ramone) you just have to laugh, because he was so loving. I don’t know how I’m going to manage, but I don’t question or ask God why. I am just thankful for the 17 years I knew him, because he was just such a wonderful person to me,” she said.
Mrs Forbes also spoke of the active role her son played as a member of the Priest Man’s River Seventh Day Adventist Church, where he was a Pathfinder and Adventist Youth (AY) leader.
Young Ramone was one of two sons she had. His older brother was 20-year-old Romar Forbes.
“Becoming a pilot was just his passion,” she said throughout the interview.
PROMISE BROKEN BY TRAGEDY
Mrs Forbes recollected that she reflected that in 2010 that she and her son had boarded an aeroplane and the pilot was welcoming the passengers.
She said Ramone had told her that in “a couple years’ time”, she was going to see him on an aeroplane welcoming the passengers and she would tell the other passengers that was her son.
However, that promise has been broken but Mrs Forbes maintains that she will not question God.
“I am happy that I had this boy for 17 years. God knows best,” she said.
