Douglas "Doug" Malewicki is an American aerospace engineer and inventor of Polish descent. Many of his inventions concern flying vehicles, but the range is quite diverse. He is also the concept creator and inventor of Skytran PRT (

personal rapid transit Personal rapid transit (PRT), also referred to as podcars or guided/railed taxis, is a public transport mode featuring a network of specially built guideways on which ride small automated vehicles that carry few (generally less than 6) passenge ...

Green vehicles

Malewicki spent 25 years advancing the Skytran concept of ultra-light computer-controlled cars hanging below aluminum

maglev Maglev (derived from '' magnetic levitation'') is a system of rail transport whose rolling stock is levitated by electromagnets rather than rolled on wheels, eliminating rolling resistance. Compared to conventional railways, maglev trains h ...

(magnetic levitation) tracks that could be supported above roads just by utility poles or the sides of buildings. Skytran basically combines maglev (which allows high speeds) and a hanging design (more stable and smaller tracks) with the 1960s' idea of personal rapid transit (PRT) -- cars that individual commuters take directly to their destination (hence "personal"), but computer-driven and available to others after they exit (hence "transit"). Another key PRT idea that Skytran follows is exiting the main track for boarding, so that the cars behind do not need to wait as they do with mass transit vehicles. In 2019, Israeli media said that Skytran was being considered as a transportation solution for bringing baggage and passengers from the new

Ramon Airport Ramon Airport () , named after Ilan and Assaf Ramon and unofficially also known as Eilat-Ramon Airport, is an international airport located in the Timna Valley in southern Israel. Ramon Airport is the second busiest in Israel (after Ben Gurion ...

to the city of Eilat, away. Skytran was advanced in Israel from 2002 and was proposed at the

Knesset The Knesset ( , ) is the Unicameralism, unicameral legislature of Israel. The Knesset passes all laws, elects the President of Israel, president and Prime Minister of Israel, prime minister, approves the Cabinet of Israel, cabinet, and supe ...

in 2011. In 2011, it was revealed that a model of Skytran was being developed with

Israel Aerospace Industries Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI; ), is Israel's major aerospace and aviation manufacturer, producing aerial and astronautic systems for both military and civilian usage. It has 14,000 employees as of 2021. IAI is state-owned by the government ...

. Malewicki developed the 157 and 156-miles-per-gallon "California Commuter" cars that hold the

Guinness Guinness () is a stout that originated in the brewery of Arthur Guinness at Guinness Brewery, St. James's Gate, Dublin, Ireland, in the 18th century. It is now owned by the British-based Multinational corporation, multinational alcoholic bever ...

fuel economy records for street-legal vehicles driven at freeway speeds — an example of

green vehicle A green vehicle, clean vehicle, eco-friendly vehicle or environmentally friendly vehicle is a road motor vehicle that produces less harmful impacts to the environment than comparable conventional internal combustion engine vehicles running o ...

s. He studied and developed various engineering solutions for highly-aerodynamic

human-powered vehicle Human-powered transport is the transport of person(s) and/or goods (freight) using human muscle power. Unlike animal-powered transport, human-powered transport has existed since time immemorial in the form of walking, running and swimming, as ...

s such as

recumbent bicycle A recumbent bicycle is a bicycle that places the rider in a laid-back reclining position, and often called a Human-powered_land_vehicle, human-powered vehicle or HPV, especially if it has an aerodynamic fairing. Recumbents are available in a w ...

Other vehicles

Malewicki developed the following vehicles and rides: *

Robosaurus Robosaurus is a transforming dinosaur robot created by inventor Doug Malewicki in 1989 and originally owned and operated by his company, Monster Robots, Inc. Robosaurus is modeled after Transformers toys with the driver sitting in the head of th ...

, a 40-foot ''

Tyrannosaurus rex ''Tyrannosaurus'' () is a genus of large theropoda, theropod dinosaur. The type species ''Tyrannosaurus rex'' ( meaning 'king' in Latin), often shortened to ''T. rex'' or colloquially t-rex, is one of the best represented theropods. It live ...

''-inspired "

entertainment robot An entertainment robot is a robot that is not made for utilitarian use, as in production or domestic services, but for the sole subjective pleasure of the human. It serves, usually the owner or his housemates, guests, or clients. Robotic technolo ...

" that bites cars and airplanes in half at car shows. This thrill ride folds into a truck and can be driven between locations. It is seen in the movie ''

Waking up in Reno ''Waking Up in Reno'' is a 2002 American road comedy-drama film directed by Jordan Brady and starring Billy Bob Thornton, Charlize Theron, Patrick Swayze, and Natasha Richardson. The screenplay by Brent Briscoe and Mark Fauser focuses on two ...

'' where it is intended to be used as a revenge tool, to consume an

SUV A sport utility vehicle (SUV) is a car classification that combines elements of road-going passenger cars with features from off-road vehicles, such as raised ground clearance and four-wheel drive. There is no commonly agreed-upon definition ...

about to be sold. *The ''X-1 Skycycle'' and

Skycycle X-2 The Skycycle X-2 was a steam rocket, steam-powered rocket owned by Evel Knievel and flown during his Snake River Canyon (Idaho), Snake River Canyon jump in Idaho in 1974. An earlier prototype was designed, named the Skycycle X-1, by Douglas Malew ...

rocket-powered motorcycle that daredevil

Evel Knievel Robert Craig Knievel (October 17, 1938November 30, 2007), known professionally as Evel Knievel (), was an American stunt performer and entertainer. Throughout his career, he attempted List of Evel Knievel career jumps, more than 75 ramp-to-ra ...

shot over the Snake River Canyon to test the viability of his Skycycle jump. (Malewicki's colleague

Robert Truax Captain Robert C. Truax ( USN) (September 3, 1917 – September 17, 2010) was an American rocket engineer in the United States Navy, and companies such as Aerojet and Truax Engineering, which he founded. Truax was a proponent of low-cost rocket ...

created the final design.) *Engineering and design assistance of the rocketbelt, the RB-2000. *The "Droid of Death" wing-morphing

unmanned aerial vehicle An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or unmanned aircraft system (UAS), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft with no human pilot, crew, or passengers onboard, but rather is controlled remotely or is autonomous.De Gruyter Handbook of Dron ...

(UAV) developed and tested under contract from

DARPA The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is a research and development agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the development of emerging technologies for use by the military. Originally known as the Adva ...

. *Patented ''Kitecycle'' for stuntman/daredevil

Bob Correll Bob "Crazy" Correll (January 7, 1942 – 2022) was an American daredevil and stuntman from Long Beach, California. According to his official biography from Balls, Unlimited, Inc., Correll enjoyed a varied career racing motorcycles, drag cars, st ...

who reached a world record with it.

Other inventions and innovations

Malewicki was also involved in the development and invention of the following: Malewicki designed the ''

Nuclear War Nuclear warfare, also known as atomic warfare, is a War, military conflict or prepared Policy, political strategy that deploys nuclear weaponry. Nuclear weapons are Weapon of mass destruction, weapons of mass destruction; in contrast to conven ...

'' card game and has sold it independently from 1965.

Rick Loomis Rick Loomis (August 24, 1946 – August 23, 2019) was an American game designer, most notable as the founder of game publisher Flying Buffalo, which he managed until his death. Career Early years Richard F. Loomis was born and raised in Scott ...

Flying Buffalo Flying Buffalo Inc. (FBI) is a game company with a line of role playing games, card games, and other gaming materials. The company's founder, Rick Loomis, began game publishing with '' Nuclear Destruction'', a play-by-mail game which started th ...

, for whom the game was one of the influences on his own ''

Nuclear Destruction ''Nuclear Destruction'' is a play-by-mail (PBM) game. It was published by Rick Loomis of Flying Buffalo Inc. in 1970. As the first professional PBM game, it started the commercial PBM industry. Offered by postal mail initially, the game is avail ...

play-by-mail game A play-by-mail game (also known as a PBM game, PBEM game, turn-based game, turn based distance game, or an interactive strategy game.) is a game played through postal mail, email, or other digital media. Correspondence chess and Go (game), Go wer ...

, noticed that people were confusing the two games with each other, so after tracking Malewicki down, he added the game to his own catalogue and started publishing ''Nuclear War'' through Flying Buffalo in 1972. Expansions included "

Nuclear Proliferation Nuclear proliferation is the spread of nuclear weapons to additional countries, particularly those not recognized as List of states with nuclear weapons, nuclear-weapon states by the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, commonl ...

", "

Nuclear Escalation Nuclear escalation is the concept of a conflict escalating from conventional warfare to nuclear warfare. Possible solutions NATO policies preventing nuclear escalation Background The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is an in ...

" and "Weapons of Mass Destruction". An aeronautical engineer by training, Malewicki spent much of his career working for American aeronautics and space companies including the

Apollo program The Apollo program, also known as Project Apollo, was the United States human spaceflight program led by NASA, which Moon landing, landed the first humans on the Moon in 1969. Apollo followed Project Mercury that put the first Americans in sp ...

Moon landing vehicles, the

stealth bomber Stealth aircraft are designed to avoid detection using a variety of technologies that reduce reflection/emission of radar, infrared, visible light, radio frequency (RF) spectrum, and audio, collectively known as stealth technology. The F-117 N ...

and

Cessna Cessna () is an American brand of general aviation aircraft owned by Textron Aviation since 2014, headquartered in Wichita, Kansas. Originally, it was a brand of the Cessna Aircraft Company, an American general aviation aircraft manufactu ...

aircraft including their first private jet airplane. He was a

model rocket A model rocket is a small rocket designed to reach low altitudes (e.g., for a model) and #Model rocket recovery methods, be recovered by a variety of means. According to the United States National Association of Rocketry, National Associati ...

enthusiast, becoming famous early in his career for the Malewicki equations that predicted the altitude and coast time of a model rocket flight. According to Malewicki's daughter, he was the inspiration for the original one-eyed monster, called Mike, on the ''

Pee-wee's Playhouse ''Pee-wee's Playhouse'' is an American comedy children's television series starring Paul Reubens as the childlike Pee-wee Herman that ran from 1986 to 1990 on Saturday mornings on CBS, and airing in reruns until July 1991. The show was develop ...

'' TV show and was later the inspiration for Mike Wazowski drawn by Ricky Nierva in ''

Monsters, Inc. ''Monsters, Inc.'' (also known as ''Monsters, Incorporated'') is a 2001 American animated comedy film produced by Pixar Animation Studios for Walt Disney Pictures. Featuring the voices of John Goodman, Billy Crystal, Steve Buscemi, James Cobu ...

''. A copy of the game plans in which he drew the first image of this alien is distributed free.

Notes

External links

*
Early Skytran website
includin

* , dedicated mainly to the Robosaurus
"Collapsible cars"
episode of ''

Junkyard Wars ''Scrapheap Challenge'' was a British television show where teams of contestants build a working machine that can perform a specific task, using materials available in a Wrecking yard, scrapyard. The series features teams of four or five membe ...

'' TV series, IMDb {{DEFAULTSORT:Malewicki, Douglas 1939 births Living people American aerospace engineers American inventors Place of birth missing (living people)