Dena De Clute
Author
The Garage Looks at Flying Cars
If you like sci-fi, you’ve probably seen movies like BLADE RUNNER (based on the book DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP by Philip K. Dick) and THE FIFTH ELEMENT. And if you’re a living, breathing, human being, you’ve seen BACK TO THE FUTURE and STAR WARS. While they vary greatly in their writing quality – and costume department – what they all have in common is flying cars.
Urban Air Mobility
Today, flying cars are known in the aviation industry and the military as eVTOL aircraft, for electric vertical take-off and landing. In some applications (such as carrying people, as opposed to cargo) they’re called air taxis.
But do we really need flying taxis?
A nine-trillion-dollar industry seems to think so.
Living in the Moment
People are sick of wasting 45 minutes to an hour crawling through a few miles of rush hour traffic. Virtual meetings are becoming the new normal, but we still have a life and places to go. Graduations, concerts, conferences, the theater, sporting events and more.
Uber Elevate recognized this in 2015 and created an air taxi ride-sharing service, which they’ve since sold to Joby Aviation. In fact, a cohort of thirty companies are working to get this industry off the ground (excuse the pun) by the 2024 Olympics in Paris.
Can’t Land on Software
While investors in the urban air mobility space are focused on software development, you can’t land on software. Having ridden in various aircraft as a US Marine, SkyStations CEO and Founder, Daniel De Clute-Melancon (who has the distinct pleasure of being my husband) recognizes this critical gap in the infrastructure.
His company, SkyStations, has developed mobile and modular vertistations (a landing pad with an electric charging station) which can be set up in parking lots and on the roofs of gas stations all over major cities.
Cool, huh?! Let’s have a chat with him.
Super Serious Sci-Fi Research
TG: Why don’t we call them flying cars, or electric helicopters? eVTOL sounds like a medication.
Dan: Because helicopters traditionally only have one or two rotors; eVTOL aircraft have between 4-18. eVTOL aircraft also have fixed wings, whereas helicopters have rotary wings.
TG: What’s the most awful traffic jam you’ve ever been in?
Dan: In Paris, when all the Metro (subway) workers were on strike forcing everyone to use surface transportation. All the taxis and cars were so overwhelmed, people were walking. The city basically came to a standstill. We were trying to get to the airport, and a thirty-minute ride took us an hour and a half.
TG: How did you find out about Uber Elevate?
Dan: Doom scrolling. (Laughs)
I was following the drone industry, and one of the websites I follow regarding drone updates had an article on a white paper written by the Uber Elevate team. It fascinated me. It was a hundred pages filled with technical information to support the fact that it’s a viable business. That was the end of 2015.
All the taxis and cars were so overwhelmed, people were walking. The city [Paris] basically came to a standstill.
TG: What books are you reading right now?
Dan: Several, though there’s one I’d recommend for entrepreneurs who are just starting out: THE INNOVATOR’S DILEMMA by Clayton M. Christensen.
TG: If you could take your wife on a date using an air taxi, where would you take her?
Dan: I would take her back to Rio de Janeiro, and have an air taxi pick us up from the airport – skipping over all the horrible city traffic – and drop us off at the top of Sugarloaf Mountain so we could have a candlelit dinner up there. I’d ask the pilot to fly us by Christ the Redeemer on the way.
TG: Good answer! Have you ever been accused of wearing an ascot?
Dan: Yes. I’ve worn one several times and looked awesome. One of my executive MBA classmates called me Dapper Dan.
Winning at Revolution Aero
TG: I hear you recently won an award for your business model in a pitch competition. Care to share?
Dan: I applied to Revolution Aero Global 2021, which had over 1000 participants, and SkyStations was selected as one of the six finalists. I pitched and won the audience vote, which was comprised of investors and industry insiders in the advanced air mobility space. (Adjusting his imaginary ascot.)
TG: Congratulations!
Not bad for a mechanical engineer whose love of vehicles goes back to the RC cars he purchased by delivering newspapers on his bike.
And he has excellent taste in women.
(Shameless plug: For more on flying, Rio de Janeiro, Paris, Marines, and the women who interest them, check out THE WRATH OF NIKE in the Infinite Crossroads series.)
The Garage Looks at MCs and MCs
Main Characters and Motorcycles
With so many awesome sport bikes out there, it was hard to pick one for my main character, Ian, in THE WRATH OF NIKE. What motorcycle do you choose for a character who: a) can fly, and obviously loves speed, b) keeps a low profile, and c) is 6’ 5” and can easily handle a heavier, torquier bike?
At first, I put him on a Yamaha YZF-R1. Other than the electric blue fairings, it ticked all the boxes. Like anyone else who visits Yamaha’s website, I could rattle off an impressive list of specs describing its 998 cc engine that produces 200 hp and 85 lb-ft of torque. Research can take me pretty far in my writing.
But ultimately, I’m more comfortable writing about things I know. And I have a fond memory associated with the R1.
Romance on an R1
For a brief period while my husband and I were dating, I worked in LA at Marine Turbine Technologies as their exhibit designer and PR liaison while he was finishing his degree at Iowa State. He visited me for spring break, and my friend loaned him his Yamaha YZF-R1. At the time, Dan rode a Honda CBR-1000RR and was more than capable of handling it. Thinking it would be a meaningful place to propose (much of his wooing occurred with me on the back of his bike with my arms wrapped around him), he fired it up and took me to a bike show one glorious sunny afternoon.
Except, instead of showcasing sleek, sexy motorcycles, it was an aftermarket show full of vendors selling junk. Like lime-green LED license plate covers, tacky, silver-spiked accessories, and airbrushed t-shirts of cartoon stunt riders. It was so cheesy, he wisely kept the ring in his pocket.
My proposal ended up happening a few days later at a Japanese jungle garden. So, he still crushed it.
Sense of humor firmly intact, I was happy with the R1 for my character…until I stumbled upon a video of the Hayabusa.
Hayabusa Hype
Ah, the Suzuki Hayabusa. A ridiculously over-the-top 1300 cc sport bike with 200 hp and 115 lb-ft of torque weighing a crushing 580 lbs. One of my coworkers rode one, and – forgive me, ‘Busa fans – despite all the hype, I thought it was hideous and too heavy to maneuver safely. I understand completely that the two are connected: The bulbous tail fairing is to improve its aerodynamics and make it faster; and the huge engine is to make it the fastest street-legal bike in mass production.
I specify “mass production” because as I mentioned, I worked for the manufacturer of the fastest street-legal motorcycle in the world, the MTT Turbine SUPERBIKE, which are made one at a time. That bike has a helicopter engine in it. Seriously, Google it.
But I digress. Before THE WRATH OF NIKE was published, I watched an interview about the major manufacturers forming a “gentleman’s agreement” limiting sport bikes to 300 KPH or less. Suzuki basically gave them the finger and made their racer replica faster, anyway. (I’m paraphrasing.) Not only that, they named it Hayabusa, which means peregrine falcon in Japanese. As in, a bird that eats other birds – like the Honda Blackbird, the (arguably) second-fastest street-legal bike after the ‘Busa.
Rude, but brilliant marketing.
Did I mention Ian is a falcon-shifter?! How could I NOT know that Hayabusa means falcon in Japanese? With a deep sigh of inevitability, I succumbed to Suzuki’s well-deserved hype, hit Ctrl+F to find “R1” all over my manuscript, and gave Ian a ‘Busa with metallic gray fairings and the Japanese character for falcon slashed in pearl black.
It almost makes me want one, myself.
The Garage
Cool Stuff From A-Z
If your house is anything like mine, the garage is the where you put all the things you love and need, but don’t use often enough to give them their own room.
My research is a lot like that. This week I might be focused on military-grade assault rifles, whereas next week, I’ll be obsessed with snake venom. My husband, Daniel, has learned to only ask what I’m up to if he’s got time for a coffee break.
Seriously. We even had to come up with a hand signal, so he can politely tell me when he can’t possibly absorb any more of what I’m telling him. And he’s got a master’s degree.
A Date with Motorcycles
This first edition of The Garage is about motorcycles. In part, as a nod to him. Though, I did have to research Yamaha YZF-R1 specifications when writing The Wrath of Nike. And I’ll no doubt have to look up the CBR1000-RR Repsol edition when I dig into Fighting for the Crown. Some people think I included sport bikes in the series to appeal to male readers’ interests.
In reality, it appeals to mine.
When I first met Daniel, he was relatively fresh out of the Marine corps (he still had a hideous buzz cut, bless) and spent most of his free time riding motorcycles. He had a grungy two-stroke (for you non-gearheads, they sound like they don’t have a muffler and smell like diesel), a sleek red, black and white liter-bike (1000-cc sport bike), and a huge dirt bike with hot pink decals. The first time I wrapped my arms around his fit waist from the passenger seat and held on tight as he climbed an impossibly high dirt hill through the woods, I was smitten. Both with him, and with motorcycles.
He spent an admirable amount of patience teaching me to ride, which in the beginning mostly consisted of pulling me out of the bushes.
Don’t judge! Counter-steering is counter-intuitive. And he’s six-foot-five, so his bike was way too big for me.
My First Sport Bike
His wedding present to me was my first sport bike, a 600-cc Honda CBR that he bought from his roommate before moving in with me. After squealing with glee, jumping up and down, and kissing him madly, I wasted no time stripping off the decals (actually, that took a lot of time) and asking the painter from the company I worked for to paint it a shimmery metallic silver.
It came out beautiful. And I was in love.
After eventually getting my motorcycle license (there may – or may not – have been an unfortunate mishap involving the overly steep DMV driveway and Daniel having to pull his 450-lb bike off of me as I bottomed-out and fell over in slow-motion), I rode my silver bullet to work as often as I dared. At the time, we lived in a small town, and the original equipment manufacturer I worked for was on the other side of about fifteen miles of farmland, requiring me to lean through innumerable +65-mph, 90-deg curves around square fields and tractors. It was terrifying.
And absolute heaven…
