What happens to an object in between the event horizons of two black holes?

Image Source Pixabay
Black holes are fascinating, even to the average joe blow. Big, massive bodies of incredibly dense material that has a gravitational pull so intense that light can't even escape it. It becomes even more mind bending for the average person when they learn that there is an area in the black hole call the "Photosphere" in which light will orbit.

Let's say you're able to hover at just the right spot in the photosphere and hang there long enough. You would potentially be able to see the back of your own head in front of you.

However, this brings up another question. Let's say you're hovering within the event horizon of a large black hole and another one just happens to want to come over and say howdy to it's neighbor and they hit it off and decide to kiss. What happens to you? Do the event horizons of the two black holes overlap each other? What happens to you in this overlapping?

Image Source Pixabay

Ok, bit of an admission, it's a trick question. It sure sounds like a reasonable question to ask though, for both questions. However, do the event horizons or "Shadows" of the black holes actually overlap at all? The answer is no, they don't.

To put this into a proper perspective, think of two lovely soap bubbles on a wet, soapy surface. The shadows of the black holes are represented by these two little bubbles chilling out and doing their bubble things, living their bubble lives as bubble buddies. When they get close enough to touch each other, their walls press together and flatten out with their opposing sides bulging out. Almost like two sumo wrestlers trying to belly thrust their opponent out of the ring.

Image Source Pixabay

For all intents and purposes, while you're within the event horizon (shadow) of a particular black hole, you won't end up in an overlap of another black holes event horizon.

So let's take this to another approach. You're not in the event horizon anymore, not completely anyway, only half of you is in there and you're maintaining enough speed and force to keep yourself halfway out indefinitely. We'll just assume you have the ability to harness infinite energy from the multiverse or something or you have magical powers like that, your pick.

Now another black hole comes and swallows your other half. Now you are within the event horizons of both black holes. So now what happens to you?

In this instance, what's going to happen is you're going to feel intense gravity, more so at your feet than your mid section, similarly your head will also experience the same, assuming the black holes have equal mass, density, charge, spin, etc.

Your body will be stretched apart super long and thin in a process called "Spaghettification" and yes, that's an actual word, not just making something up to sound weird or silly. Feel free to look it up in your spare time. You'll be stretched further and further until finally your mid section would snap and the individual black holes will divide you up between themselves like an unhappy couple wanting a divorce.

Image Source Pixabay I'm also sure you're not nearly as delicious.

Now the reality behind this is that these two black holes when this close are orbiting each other exceptionally fast so likely the event horizon of the second black hole would end up coming at you from the side or back and swallow you up in that way and you would become broken in half in that regard so your individually halfs would be spaghettified respectively.

It's a little gruesome, regardless of how you slice it. Oh, too soon?

Hopefully this helped in understanding the answer to this particular scenario and gained just a little bit more of an understanding of the beasts of the universe.

Got a burning question that you want answered in as simple of a way as possible? Leave your question in the comments!