Mayhap is an archaic way to say maybe or perhaps. It is an adverb in construction. It does not have a plural and should not be written as mayhaps. It has largely been replaced by other words, including those used to define it, like maybe and perhaps.
A mishap is an accident or unfortunate coincidence. The plural is mishaps.
A snafu, on the other hand, is a hard or complicated problem or the mistake that causes the confusing problem. The plural is snafus. It was coined in the 1940s as an acronym for ‘situation normal all fouled up’. It should be noted that this term is used mainly in the United States in informal situations.
Examples
Mayhap a superpartner particle can be found lurking in this profusion by, say, 2017. [The Hindu]
Who knows? Mayhap the Gray Lady can give Snowden a blog from which he can lecture readers about privacy rights, as he did in a recent Christmas greeting video. [SF Gate]
An Oak Forest man died Monday after he became pinned between two vehicles in a towing mishap on the Northwest Side. [NBC Chicago]
This takes the number of officers facing action — mainly in the shape of court martial — to well over 30 for the string of warship and submarine mishaps since July 2013. [Times of India]
The owner of Rotterdam Square Mall is blaming National Grid for a billing snafu that reportedly nearly resulted in the shopping center’s utility service being cut this past weekend. [Albany Business Review]
Voting snafus are a perennial national embarrassment that have persisted even after the painful debacle of the 2000 presidential election. [Boston Globe]
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