Gil Gerard, Buck Rogers in the 25th Century star, dies aged 82

Gil Gerard, best known for starring as the hero in Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, has died aged 82.

The actor, who was living in Georgia, unexpectedly died on Tuesday morning after battling cancer.

His wife Janet announced the news in a Facebook post, sharing that he had ‘lost his fight with a rare and viciously aggressive form of cancer’.

‘From the moment when we knew something was wrong to his death this morning was only days,’ she continued, adding: ‘No matter how many years I got to spend with him it would have ever been enough. Hold the ones you have tightly and love them fiercely.’

Buck Rogers in the 25th Century originally aired on NBC in the US from 1979 to 1981, with Gerard as the wisecracking William ‘Buck’ Rogers – initially in a TV movie that was later released in cinemas, before it was developed into two seasons of a television show.

A 20th century pilot who wakes up after 500 years of suspended animation and defends the Earth from space villains, Buck Rogers was a sci-fi hero who first appeared in a newspaper comic strip in 1929 and famously in a 1939 movie serial with Olympic swimmer Buster Crabbe.

The show was developed following the runaway success of Star Wars.

Gerard, who was born on January 23, 1943, in Little Rock, Arkansas, largely kicked off his career as an actor by starring in commercials – nearly 400 of them, including working as a spokesperson for Ford Motor Company.

He starred in daytime soap opera The Doctors from 1973 to 1976, before appearing in episodes of Little House on the Prairie and Hawaii Five-O.

Gerard also played Frank Powers in the disaster film Airport ’77 alongside veteran Hollywood actors James Stewart, Olivia de Havilland, Jack Lemon and Joseph Cotten.

This breaking news story is being updated.