News broke late last week that we’d lost another member of the Deadliest Catch family. In an announcement on December 28, we learned the world had lost Nick McGlashan, a worker on the Summer Bay ship and a member of the Discovery show community. It’s been a tough year for that family as in July we learned of the passing of Mahlon Reyes, a deckhand on the show who had reportedly had a heart attack at the time of his passing. Now, cause of death has been revealed for Reyes and it seems it was cocaine-related.
When Mahlon Reyes died, like Nick McGlashan, he was still young, dying at the age of 38. His wife Heather Sullivan was the person who broke the news in early August, stating her husband had suffered a heart attack in late July. He was rushed to the hospital and was put on life support for a couple of days, as he was unresponsive once admitted. Unfortunately, Reyes ultimately passed on July 27th of last year.
According to a new report over at USA Today, Brian Heino of Flathead County Sheriff's Office in Montana ultimately underwent an autopsy. The report found that Mahlon had ultimately died of “acute cocaine intoxication” rather than the heart attack that had been intimated at the time of the Deadliest Catch star’s passing. His death was ruled as accidental.
Just a few days ago, Nick McGlashan also died, though his cause of death has yet to be determined. He was only 33 at the time of his death and had paid tribute to Mahlon Reyes at the time of his passing earlier in 2020, sharing:
A separate Facebook post on Mahlon's "Rest Easy" page celebrated the lives of the two Deadliest Catch stars one more time.
Working in the industry highlighted by Discovery’s Deadliest Catch is fraught with danger; there’s a reason the show sports the name it does. And even when work on crab fishing doesn’t lead to physical danger and ailments it can take a mental toll. The deaths of Mahlon Reyes and Nick McGlashan are not the first young men we’ve seen on the show who later passed at a fairly young age. In 2018, Captain Blake died at age 38 of an accidental overdose. In 2011, Justin Tennison was found dead at 33 in a particular tragedy related to sleep apnea.
Deaths always come with sadness and grief, but it often hurts that much more when it feels like people have been taken in the prime of their lives. Mahlon Reyes’ wife Heather did tell USA Today that she and their four children “laugh” and “remember all the funny stories” to keep Reyes’ memory alive. Our thoughts go out to them during this time.
