Peter Weber has been officially announced as The Bachelor's Season 24 star.
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Peter, an airline pilot from California, was brought out onstage during the Bachelor in Paradise reunion portion of the show's three-hour finale for Season 6 that aired Tuesday night on ABC.
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"Now the time has come for our next Bachelor to step up to the plate. The moment you've been waiting for all night is finally here. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome our next Bachelor -- Peter!" The Bachelor host Chris Harrison announced.
When Peter walked out, the audience cheered loudly and he kept repeating, "Wow," and, "Oh my God." He seemed overwhelmed and almost in disbelief.
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"It's still hitting me right now, and I feel so grateful right now just to have this opportunity in front of me. I feel emotional right now, man. This is crazy; this is life changing!" Peter said.
"I have truly, my entire life, looked forward to finding my girl and that person I cannot wait to spend the rest of my life with."
The pilot continued, "I've had the most amazing example of my parents growing up, and I felt like the luckiest kid ever, you know? I saw so much love in my household and 30 some odd years later now, they are still in love with each other. I want that for myself. I know my brother wants that."
"I have all the faith in the world this can work for me," he added, "and I know it's going to."
Peter finished Hannah Brown's season of The Bachelorette in third place earlier this year. Peter fell in love with Hannah and was blindsided by his rejection, especially after they had slept together four times in the Fantasy Suite.
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"Hannah was amazing. She is amazing. I learned a ton from her... From Night 1, with that first toast until the end when I had to say goodbye to her, she was 100 percent unapologetically herself, and I love that. That's something I definitely want to carry forward with my journey now," Peter shared.
"That's what it takes to truly find your person in this process."
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When Chris asked if anything scares or worries Peter going into filming of The Bachelor's 24th season -- which begins this upcoming weekend -- Peter laughed.
"This is not normal, dating 30 women at the same time. I've never done this before, so there's going to be ups and downs. I know that's coming, and I'm not going to be perfect, you know, being in this position now," Peter explained.
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"The possibility of making the wrong decision is out there, but I'm going to follow my heart. And as cliche as that sounds, I trust this... [I know] what I want. I know my grandparents are looking down on me and will be guiding me as well, and God. I just can't believe this."
Chris noted Peter will be different from any Bachelor they've ever had, pointing out how the pilot lives only five minutes from The Bachelor mansion.
"Yeah, no joke! This is crazy," Peter said with a laugh, adding that he used to try to sneak onto the mansion's grounds when he was younger.
"Now, I'm going to be there on Night 1 with the limos coming in and meeting however many women. That's crazy to me."
Peter admitted he was "very nervous" when he stepped out of a limo to meet Hannah that first night and advised his group of bachelorettes not to make the same mistakes he did.
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"I don't remember anything I said to Hannah. Thank God I don't look like a fool, but I know exactly the shoes that they're in. Looking back on it, maybe I took a little too long to fully open up and if I can just give the women any advice, it's don't do that," Peter explained.
"Show me that vulnerable, raw side from the beginning. If you're feeling it with me and you're starting to fall, tell me. If you're pissed at me and I did something wrong, tell me -- don't hold back. And I promise you if you do that, I'll give it right back 100 percent."
Peter concluded, "This is going to be one of the most beautiful love stories ever, and I just can't wait for it to begin."
Online spoilers from audience members who attended the reunion when it was filmed on August 27 gave away prematurely that Peter was announced as The Bachelor's next leading man.
Additional reports that Peter had been selected as the Bachelor had also surfaced prior to the reunion's filming.
Peter has been considered one of the frontrunners to be selected as The Bachelor's Season 24 star since he was eliminated by Hannah at the Rose Ceremony in which she selected Tyler Cameron and Jed Wyatt as her final two bachelors.
Peter had admitted he would be interested in being the next The Bachelor star after his The Bachelorette ouster aired on ABC in July.
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"I know this whole situation didn't work out the way I was hoping, but Hannah truly showed me a different love than I had ever felt," he told People at the time.
"So it's given me hope that I have more love to find. I wouldn't say no to trying it again because I know the experience works. And I'm hopeful that my person is right around the corner."
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However, many Peter fans worried one of his ex-girlfriends had jeopardized his chances of starring on the franchise in 2020.
An Atlanta-based model named Calee Lutes publicly came forward in July and accused the airline pilot of suddenly and unexpectedly dumping her just before Christmas 2018 to go on The Bachelorette in an interview with Entertainment Tonight.
"He absolutely betrayed me. He interviewed for a reality dating show while simultaneously planning a future with me," Calee told ET about Peter.
Calee had claimed she met Peter on a dating app in June 2018 and they maintained a "very serious" but long-distance relationship for six months during which Peter said, "I love you," and they met each other's families and talked about having a future together and eventually welcoming children.
Calee had said Peter dumped her two days before Christmas 2018 and she felt "devastated and completely blindsided," especially since he supposedly offered no good reason as to why he wanted to end things.
RELATED LINK: 'THE BACHELOR' FRANCHISE COUPLES NOW: WHO IS STILL TOGETHER?? (PHOTOS)
Calee had told ET that she thought Peter dumped her to go on The Bachelorette because she noticed late last year a show producer had begun following Peter on Instagram and then he deleted every trace of Calee from his page.
"I trusted him entirely and he pulled the rug out from under me," claimed Calee, who had said she found out about Peter's casting on The Bachelorette in March 2019 when the rest of the world did.
"Also, if all of this wasn't bad enough, I've had multiple people reach out to me and tell me that he was seeing other women while we were exclusive."
However, Peter denied ever dumping Calee for a shot to star on The Bachelorette.
"There was a lot of truth to what she said in her story, but there is also a lot of truth that wasn't mentioned," Peter told People in late July. "The show had absolutely nothing to do with me ending that relationship."
He added at the time, "I was very serious in trying to progress that relationship and move it forward, and she wasn't on the same page as me. That being said, I wasn't going to waste her time or my time. But the casting process and my first interview was months after we broke up."
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Peter received a lot of support from Bachelor Nation while the so-called scandal was unfolding, including former The Bachelorette star Rachel Lindsay and former The Bachelor star Nick Viall, who defended Peter.
Tyler, who finished as Hannah's runner-up on The Bachelorette, and Mike Johnson, who was eliminated before the beauty queen's hometown dates, had been considered the other two favorites to be chosen to star on the next season of The Bachelor.
However, Tyler essentially immediately removed himself from contention when he began a high-profile romance with supermodel Gigi Hadid only days after the finale of Hannah's season of The Bachelorette aired on ABC in late July.
As for Mike, he had a pretty quiet edit on Bachelor in Paradise's sixth season.
Although The Bachelor's 24th season hasn't started filming yet, the show has already released the names and photos of 33 bachelorettes who may be competing on the series when it premieres on Monday, January 6, 2020.
The announcement was made on The Bachelor's official Facebook page early Tuesday morning.
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Click here to see a gallery of photos of all the bachelorettes who will be competing for Peter's heart.
RELATED LINK: 'THE BACHELOR' FRANCHISE COUPLES NOW: WHO IS STILL TOGETHER?? (PHOTOS)
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