- Wan Hu. A minor officer in the Ming Dynasty died while trying to launch himself into space using a rocket.

- William Bullock. Born 1813, died 1867, Bullock had his foot crushed while trying to repair a rotary printing press that he had invented. The resulting infection would later prove fatal.

- Otto Lilienthal died August 10, 1896 from injuries sustained two days earlier in a crash of one of his hang gliders.

- Thomas Midgley, Jr. accidentally strangled himself with the cord of a pulley-operated mechanical bed of his own design in 1944.

- Alexander Bogdanov, a physician and scientist, conducted an experiment for a "rejuvenation" technique wherein he deliberately gave himself a transfusion of blood from a student who suffered from malaria and tuberculosis. He died of the subsequent infections.

- Franz Reichelt. "The Flying Tailor" jumped off the Eiffel Tower while trying out his combined overcoat/parachute invention. The parachute failed to open and he died from the fall.

Popular myth
Contrary to popular belief Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, the supposed inventor of the guillotine, did not himself directly invent it and did not die by it, nor did Haman invent the gallows - he was simply hanged on the gallows he had built.