8 Saturday, March 3, 2018 US aircraft carrier to make historic Vietnam visit In rural , The nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson will reportedly make a historic visit to Vietnam as part of the Navy’s largest multinational disaster response exercises in the Indo-Pacific region. The Carl Vinson will be the first The Pacific Partnership 2018 ‘mobile banking’ U.S. carrier to visit Vietnam since exercises also include the military the end of the Vietnam War in sealift command hospital ship 1975, underscoring the new level USNS Mercy, which will visit UAE to open Arab world’s of cooperation between the former countries bordering the South adversariesU.S. incarrier the face of to China’s make historicChina Sea,Vietnam including Vietnam, visit SouthThe U.S.China Navy Sea encroachment is sending an and aircraft carrierIndonesia to Vietnam and Malaysia, for the accordingfirst time sinceother the endpotential of the threats. Vietnam War in 1975. The visitto a comes news release. amid regional first nuclear power plant security concerns over Chinese claims in the South China Sea ARL INSON means a bank on USS C V Displacement: 88,000 tonnes Nimitz-class carrier Typical aircraft capacity: Approximately 60+ Length: 333m

Propulsion: Two nuclear reactors Speed: 30+ knots Crew: 5,200 a truck CHINA TAIWAN Hanoi PACIFIC LAOS Scarborough OCEAN Shoal Da Nang Nico Bandick is a Sparkasse Carl Vinson Paracel Manila: Carrier employee in Brandenburg and two other departs Feb 20 ships due to Islands dock in March SOUTH ank manager Juergen logo of the widely popular said. Local politicians who He has no access to the cash as part of VIETNAM CHINA Schaller never expected savings banks group closed sit on the Sparkasse board on board, and so far he’s had annual Pacific SEA B Partnership PHILIPPINES to end up getting a trucker’s their doors last year. were reluctant to plunge their no run-ins with would-be exercises licence and driving 20,000 A similar trend is seen constituents into a bankless bankrobbers. Spratly kilometres per year. across the country as a whole: wilderness as the number of Islands But as brick-and-mortar nationwide, the number of closures mount. Closures keep coming 400km branches vanish from the physical bank branches has So, they opted to hit the road Banking sector experts predict 250 miles rolling Franconia region of plunged by a quarter over the instead in one of Germany’s that the Europe-wide trend northern , the neatly past 15 years to 35 per 100,000 66 itinerant branches. towards fewer bank branches dressed savings bank executive people, according to a study In the bank’s trailer, will continue apace. jumps behind the wheel four by public investment bank 70-something Maria “The speed at which it will MALAYSIA days a week to bring mobile KfW. Neubauer is happy to wait for happen is hard to predict, BRUNEI services -- including cash The European average is 37 an appointment with Schaller and will depend above all on INDONESIA machine and consultation per 100,000, with Spaniards in his tiny office during his how the banks manage to RIVAL CLAIMS China Taiwan Philippines room -- to tiny countryside the most spoiled for choice 90-minute stop opposite the keep branches relevant as a Vietnam Malaysia Brunei villages. with 67. church in the slate-tiled village channel for their customers,” Sources: Associated Press, Stratfor, U.S. Navy © GRAPHIC NEWS The switch from desk Steffen Haberzettl, the sales of Tschirn. said Thomas Schnarr of to dashboard has enabled director for the - “The Sparkasse bus is great consultancy Oliver Wyman. The daring Chandrayaan-2 lunar mission Schaller “to do something else Kulmbach Sparkasse, said it for making transfers, or doing Nevertheless, “human India’s Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft will attempt to land a briefcase-sized while staying in touch with the was primarily local businesses anything you need,” she said. relationships remain rover onto the Moon’s surface, 600km from the lunar south pole, while customers”, he said. and older people who had not “We’re happy, especially fundamental. Especially an orbiter above searches for water — vital to future manned missions High-street banks are embraced online banking who those of us who don’t have a complicated questions require Payload HISTORICAL N Sea of increasingly being forced to were taking advantage of the car” to visit a branch further personalized advice for retail faring LANDING Tranquillity SITES shutter branches, as more and mobile branch, which first set away, another villager Maria clients and businesses”, his Lander more customers go online, off on its rounds in 2015. Greiner said as she printed colleague Alexander Peitsch Craft rural populations shrink and an account statement from a said.

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TAGE low interest rates eat into ‘Anything you need’ nearby machine. For his part, Juergen Orbiter profits. Haberzettl estimated that Other customers were busy Schaller said he is not qualified 3 Craft As a result, banks such as around 20 people visited the withdrawing cash on the chilly to provide such specialist (OC) the public-sector Sparkassen, bank at each stop, equivalent town square from the ATM counselling to his clients, Luna Equator where Schaller is a branch to 12,000 customer contacts embedded in the flank of the many of whom know him by Surveyor S Chandrayaan-2 manager, are having to rethink a year -- a tiny number trailer. name. S

49.13m Apollo landing site TAGE Mission cost: their business models. compared with some 8,800 Schaller makes his rounds Instead, he passes on $150m LANDER In Schaller’s Kronach- online banking logins per day. to small villages such as this individual requests for loans 2 Equipped with seismometer Kulmbach district alone, But “we invested in this from Monday to Thursday, or investments to a colleague to detect moon- tucked away in the southeast service for our clients knowing keeping Fridays free to do sitting in one of the Sparkasse’s quakes and corner of Germany, six that it wouldn’t make enough maintenance work on the red brick-and-mortar branches. Solar Langmuir probe panel to measure branches sporting the red “S” money to pay for itself”, he and white truck and trailer. (AFP) plasma fluctuations S TAGE Solar panel Landing and antenna 1 skid

Launch site Door/ ramp New ROVER Delhi Will move around INDIA Geosynchronous Bay of near landing site in Satellite Launch semi-autonomous mode Bengal A Sparkasse bus in Vehicle Mark II Sriharikota observing lunar surface Navigation (GSLV Mk II) and analysing soil cameras Brandenburg Sources: Science, Futurism, Spaceflight Insider, Planetary Society, ISRO, NASA © GRAPHIC NEWS