What It's Like to Die in a Black Hole

In terms of "coolest ways to die," it's hard to beat "sucked into a black hole." The question's just: what would that entail, exactly? No one has first-hand experience. Would you spend weeks floating past its event horizon, before eventually being ripped apart? Or would you--as string theorist Joseph Polchinski recently proposed--soar into a "seething maelstrom of particles... hit a wall of fire and be burned to a crisp in an instant"? More