Myfanwy

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Myfanwy, whose real name is Max Klemke, was a ScienceMadness user who, at the young age of fifteen, we understand died, possibly during an attempt at synthesizing phosgene. His case is a sad example of how being negligent with safety in a chemistry environment can lead to serious consequences.

Background

Born in 1994, Klemke joined SM in October, 2009. Klemke frequented the Energetic Materials sub forum, posting information and questions involving very dangerous and deadly chemicals, such as acetone peroxide, hydrogen cyanide, and phosgene. His posts ended suddenly after posting about phosgene.

Klemke also posted videos of his dangerous experiments on YouTube, his channel can been viewed here.

Videos and dangerous experiments

As stated before, Myfanwy had a YouTube channel with a similar name, depicting some of his often dangerous experiments without taking proper safety procedures. Most of his more dangerous videos were deleted from his channel, presumably after his death, though some of them can be found, reuploaded by other YouTubers. Such videos include:

Synthesis of Chloropicrin

Synthesis of HCN and NaCN

Detonation of Ammonium nitrate w/nitromethane (ANNM)

Producing and igniting large amounts of explosives and thermites, including manganese heptoxide, hydrogen, and Al/CaSO4 thermite

Death

Like most of who appear to disappear on the internet, there is no solid evidence surrounding Klemke's death(no news articles or records were ever found). There are various rumors about his including that his death may have been a suicide attempt, or that he died of cyanide poisoning, or even both.

Shortly after his abrupt cease of activity on both Science Madness and YouTube, a person who identified himself as a friend of Klemke's commented on one of his videos, stating that (s)he had came into contact with Klemke's family, and they were told the official cause of death was pulmonary edema. Along with this, and the fact that his last post is of him underestimating the dangers of phosgene, it was concluded that, if Klemke had indeed died, he may have done so in an experiment involving phosgene.