U.S. Navy Lieutenant Andy Baldwin completed "Operation Soulmate" as The Bachelor: Officer and a Gentleman's object of affection, and now the 30-year-old undersea medical officer will reportedly have a new, much more serious mission to undertake.
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Baldwin, currently stationed in Hawaii, will be deployed to Iraq for six to 12 months, his representative confirmed to Us Weekly in a report published online Wednesday. "He leaves in January," Baldwin's representative told Us.
Baldwin presented his final rose and also proposed marriage to his selected suitor Tessa Horst, a 26-year-old San Francisco social worker, during ABC's May broadcast of Officer and a Gentleman's pre-taped finale.
In the same report, a separate "Baldwin pal" also told Us that the former The Bachelor star's upcoming deployment "was a factor" in his "split from his fiancee." However, given Horst hasn't been Baldwin's fiancee since the couple publicly announced the end of their engagement in August, it remains unclear whether Us was referring to the couple's previous no-longer-engaged "split" or reporting a new, complete split that incorrectly still termed Horst a "fiancee."
In their August announcement, Baldwin and Horst had insisted that, despite the end of their engagement, they were still very much together. The pair had also cited that the possibility that Baldwin may soon be ending his current Pearl Harbor assignment as the reason behind Horst's decision to cancel her original plan to relocate to Hawaii.
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"We are very much in love and committed to our relationship," the couple had stated in an August statement that announced the decision to end their engagement. "With the possibility of reassignment to a new location, we decided it was not the ideal time for Tessa to uproot herself and move out [to Hawaii] right now. Our relationship continues to deepen, and we're very hopeful about our future together."
After The Bachelor's May finale broadcast, Horst had told reporters that she planned to relocate to Hawaii "in the coming months... the next few months."
Prior to the premiere of The Bachelor's Spring 2007 installment, Baldwin had told reporters that he had "another year at least" stationed in Hawaii, and then he'd probably look "to do another tour" there.
But he also apparently understood the nature of his position in the military, as he was quick to add the Aloha State wasn't his final resting place.
"That's another thing the women coming on the show really had to take into account was I am a naval officer and I can get called away on deployment at any time," said Baldwin.
About The Author: Steven Rogers