Bachelor Nation contestants have had some seriously scary incidents involving boats! After the earring-loving Brayden Bowers and his Bachelor in Paradise castmate Aaron Schwartzman were stranded in the water for nearly four hours when their boat sank 15 miles away from shore last fall, Jenn Tran — the star of The Bachelorette Season 21, which hits the 2024 TV schedule on July 8 — revealed that she was nearly decapitated in a boating accident. In fact it was apparently that harrowing experience that inspired her to look for love on The Bachelor in the first place.
Jenn Tran is set to kick off her journey to find love, but it turns out she very nearly rejected The Bachelor producers’ offer to appear on Joey Graziadei’s season. While she had gone through the audition process after being contacted by the show, she was in school to be a physician assistant and, as she said on the Call Her Daddy podcast, she didn’t think she could put her studies on hold. However, right before filming started, a close call changed everything. Jenn said:
I got into kind of a bad boating accident with my friends. It sounds dramatic because I almost did die, but — I hate talking about it, because everybody was fine — there was a boat that basically rammed into us, and this was like a week before I was supposed to go on the show. I was like, well, I almost died, so I’m gonna do it. So I called my school and I was like, ‘Hey, I have this opportunity.’
There’s nothing like a little near-death experience to put things in perspective! Jenn Tran decided to take the leap into reality dating, and if she hadn’t joined Joey Graziadei’s cast, she wouldn’t be where she is today — representing The Bachelor franchise as its first Asian-American lead. It is scary to hear the circumstances she went through to make that decision, though, even if everyone turned out OK. She said of the wreck:
Literally, it was insane, like I was on a boat with my friends, and this boat was coming right at us, didn’t see us, and I was sitting in the exact place where the boat would have decapitated me. Thank God I was paying attention, because I jumped to the other side of the boat so quickly. We got into a crash, like whatever, but everybody was fine after that.
It sounds like Jenn’s life flashed before her eyes, and she decided after that to fully embrace the opportunities that came her way. The upcoming Bachelorette continued:
It was really that moment where I was like, I almost just died and I have nothing to say for this. Like, I haven’t been loved. I’m single and lonely, and I’m in P.A. school, and my entire life has been toward school, and I need to do something for myself.
Jenn Tran made it to Week 7 before being sent home by Joey Graziadei in the last rose ceremony before Hometowns. Now she’s making history as The Bachelorette’s first Asian lead — which is a huge deal in a franchise that has faced criticism for its lack of diversity. New executive producers Claire Freeland and Bennett Graebner recently addressed the issue, saying it was “inexcusable” that it took 15 years for the franchise to cast a Black lead. To date, only 5 leads in 48 seasons have been people of color. Jenn Tran will be the sixth.
Tune in to see how it all plays out! The Bachelorette Season 21 premieres at 8 p.m. ET Monday, July 8, on ABC, with episodes available to stream the next day with a Hulu subscription.