The Life and Times of Warren Hansen

I got my mission call this week! I’ll be serving in the Salta, Argentina mission speaking Spanish. I have a week of online MTC starting August 21 then go to the Mexico City MTC for 5 weeks before finally making it to Salta, located in the northwest point of Argentina, bordering Chile, Bolivia, and Paraguay. Between now and then, I have to make it through another month of school, 6 weeks of training this summer, and totally out-processing from West Point and the army.

_{Opening my mission call on Zoom so my parents could be with me. My mom was visiting my Grandma, so she got to join in. And Jane was working a late shift, so she was home and got to jump on. I made a big announcement at Institute that night to let my friends know.}

My summer has shaped up to be everything that I hoped it would be. In the week between finals and raduation (which is mandatory for everyone), I am taking what’s called Grad Week Swim. The normal class is taken by Yuks (Sophomores) and is a full term long, giving cadets everything from a basic knowledge of swimming to simulated practice in a helicopter crash over the ocean in full battle equipment. Because I swam fast enough during a test, I made it to Grad Week Swim which takes most of the instruction out of the course, leaving essentially just the tests. By passing Survival Swim during Grad Week, you get to free up space in your schedule next year, so I’m hoping I do well.

After graduation, I have a week to go home before starting Cadet Field Training, known as CFT. Where Cadet Basic Training was a crash course on military customs and courtesies and being a cadet, briefly touching on soldier stuff like shooting and trauma care, CFT is full immersion in soldiering. During CFT, cadets live exclusively at Camp Buckner (the military training area) and do everything from obstacle courses and firing mortars to flying in helicopters and using military explosives. Following CFT, I’ll get to go home for the week of the 4th of July before coming back to West Point for Air Assault School.

Air Assault is a 10-day course that teaches soldiers helicopter operations, repelling from and attaching things to helicopters. The first couple of days consist of classroom time, memorizing details about helicopters and hand signals to communicate with pilots, and culminates with a written test. During the second stage, the course teaches soldiers how to inspect sling loads (stuff that you’re going to attach under a helicopter). At the end of the 3 days, students are given 30 seconds per sling load to find mistakes on the complex arrays of chains and cables on cannons, cargo pallets, trucks, and water and fuel tanks. The final stage teaches repelling, first from a tower, then out of a helicopter. Throughout the course, there are detailed inspections of the packing list, where failure to have items as little as a plastic bag or yellow highlighter will get you kicked out and forced to restart (called recycling). Air Assault is a physically demanding course, but I’m excited for the challenge.

_{Me with my good friend and fellow future-missionary Caleb Watson, practicing the Air Assault obstacle course last weekend.}

After Air Assault, I’ll finish resigning my cadetship and move my stuff to my uncle’s house in Connecticut, before heading home to get ready for my mission.