Cole Tesar, an army specialist, recently met his 7-month-old daughter Harper for the first time after being deployed in Afghanistan for the past nine months, according to reports.
Harper's photo, which shows an image of the girl onboard a stroller and with a placard that said: "Hey I just met you and this is crazy but my name's Harper and I'm your baby," was picked up by Nebraska's WOWT, which posted it on their Facebook page.
Immediately after, the photo went viral and has already garnered approximately 1.5 million likes.
WOWT told Yahoo News that one of their station's news anchors is friends with Harper's father. The station then asked if it would be alright to share the family's photo, to which they agreed.
Tesar told WOWT in an interview: "It's kind of different because it's my own baby; it is our own blood. It is definitely special and it is a pretty good feeling."
Cole's wife, Logan, told WOWT: "With ultrasounds and when I went into labor and doctor's appointments, it was hard not having him there."
Despite these challenges, Cole said he never really lost track of where he's headed.
"Knowing that when it was all said and done, I would be with my family, I would be able to hold my baby for the first time, and be back with Logan and start a family," he said.
One of the network's news anchors, Amy Adams, told Yahoo News: "This proves social media is a powerful tool for journalists. Little Harper meeting her dad is now a worldwide news."
Adams shared that the initial intent for posting the photo was merely to help cheer up their Facebook followers "who are sick of the cold weather."
