“Deadliest Catch” graduate and deckhand from Northwestern University turned 59

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Nick Mavar, who appeared in the Discovery Channel reality series Deadliest catchdied Thursday in Naknek, AK, Bristol Bay Police Chief Jeffrey Eldie confirmed to Deadline. He was 59 years old.

According to Eldie, Mavar suffered a medical emergency at a shipyard in Naknek on Thursday afternoon. Paramedics were called and he was taken to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead, from natural causes, Eldie says.

The tall, gruff Mavar with the rough voice appeared in 98 episodes on Deadliest catch from 2005 to 2021, as well as several spinoffs, including Deadliest catch: Siberian winter And Deadliest catch: the bait. Mavar served as a deckhand, maintaining Sig Hansen’s F/V Northwestern and its mechanical equipment. He left the series after his appendix ruptured on board in December 2020, a medical scare documented on the show.

Mavar later sued the owners of the F/V Northwestern, claiming there was no adequate plan in place to provide him with adequate medical attention during the pandemic. The boat’s owners, in turn, sued the show’s production company, claiming it also “did not have an adequate plan” to obtain outside medical attention during the Covid-19 pandemic.

He was a familiar face to fans due to his status on the Northwestern, captained by Hansen, the franchise’s de facto elder statesman. Mavar was also the uncle of former Northwestern rookie turned deckhand and later Saga captain Jake Anderson. Mavar played a key role in one of the show’s longest-running storylines by helping his nephew get off drugs and alcohol.

In 2021, Anderson posted a photo with his uncle online, along with a tribute that read, in part, “I love you Uncle Nick Mavar, you are the embodiment of a fisherman. Thank you for pulling me out of the swamp so many years ago.”

Mavar’s death comes just days after Deadliest catch Captain “Wild” Bill Wichrowski publicly announced his prostate cancer diagnosis. Wichrowski’s deck chief on Deadliest catch, Nick McGlashan died in 2020 from the effects of his addiction.

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