PGPool II - Failover when current master node dies
Sounds like you might have incorrect values for your failover_command value. And Typically the failover script is run on pgpool server, not the database node.

failover_command = '/etc/pgpool-II/failover.sh %d %H %P /tmp/postgresql.trigger.failover [hostname of failover pgpool server]'


This configuration above is passing the new master candidate and an argument to my failover script which is executed on pgpool but ultimately promotes the master candidate (which is a hot standby) to a master using postgresql.