American free-diver, fashion model, actress, conservationist and television personality
Mehgan Heaney-Grier
Born
Mehgan Renee Heaney
(1977-08-26) August 26, 1977 (age 46)
Duluth, Minnesota
Occupation(s)
Fashion model, free-diver
Mehgan Heaney-Grier (born Mehgan Renee Heaney; August 26, 1977) is an American champion freediver, fashion model, actress, conservationist, and TV personality.[1][2]
Early life
Heaney-Grier was born in Duluth, Minnesota to Bill and Renee Heaney. Her parents divorced when she was six years old.[3] When she was eleven years old her mother remarried to Nelson Grier and in the summer of 1989, Heaney-Grier, along with her sister Erin, mother and new stepfather moved to the Florida Keys. When she was 16 years old, she legally changed her last name to Heaney-Grier.
Freediving
Heaney-Grier on record setting freedive 1997Free-diver Mehgan Heaney-Grier swimming while wearing a mermaid tail.
In 1996 at the age of 18 Heaney-Grier established the first constant weight free-diving record in the United States with a dive to 155 feet (47 meters) on a single breath of air. The following year she beat her own record with a dive to 165 feet (50 meters),[4][5] When she set her second US record, the women's world record for free diving was 204.5 feet (62.3 meters).[3]
In 1998 Heaney-Grier captained the first United States Freediving Team to compete in the World Cup Freediving Championships held in Sardinia, Italy.[6] In 2000, Heaney-Grier was inducted as part of the inaugural roster into the Women Divers Hall of Fame.[4]
Modeling
Heaney-Grier has modeled for, and been featured in, numerous catalogs and magazines including People, Outside, Life, Vogue Japan, Abercrombie & Fitch. She has also been a public relations ambassador for Omega Watches.[7]
Television
In the late 1990s, Heaney-Grier partnered with her diving trainers, Manny Puig and Mark Rackley (who was at the time also Heaney-Grier's boyfriend), filming underwater encounters with animals such as alligators and sharks.[8] Rackley had worked as a spearfisherman and underwater videographer,[3] and Puig had experience as an animal handler on movie sets[3] and had learned how to ride and handle alligators in their environment.[8] Together with Heaney-Grier, they formed a company named Extreme Encounters, and the footage they produced led to the Animal Planet series titled Extreme Contact.[3] The 20-episode series featured the trio in cage-free encounters with sharks, alligators and other aquatic wildlife.[9] They also worked on a USA Network one-hour special titled "Deep Diver: Tiger Shark Odyssey".[2] In 2002, Heaney-Grier went on to other projects.[2]
In 1999 Heaney-Grier had a guest-starring role as a free-diver on an episode of Baywatch, and a starring role on a UPN movie of the week, Avalon:Beyond the Abyss, produced by Viacom Productions. Heaney-Grier has been a featured guest on the Late Show with David Letterman, London's TFI Friday, Primetime Live with Anderson Cooper and Ripley's Believe it or Not. Heaney-Grier also hosted Saturn's Gravity Files, covering the Gravity Games in 2004, and the Mad Fin Shark Series for ESPN in 2008.
In 2015 Heaney-Grier co-starred as a member of a 5-person exploration team on the reality show Treasure Quest: Snake Island, which documents the search for the legendary Treasure of the Trinity on Snake Island, Brazil.
Stunt work
In 2003, Heaney-Grier was sought by the director of Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, Gore Verbinski, to perform an underwater stunt for Keira Knightley.[10] Heaney-Grier has also performed underwater stunts, including scuba diving, free diving and working with sharks, as a stunt double for Jessica Alba and Ashley Scott in Into the Blue, and for actress Olivia Wilde in Turistas.
Other work
Heaney-Grier was featured in the books A Family of Women by Carolyn Jones.[11] and Freedive! by Terry Maas and David Sipperly,[12]
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