> anything falling in approaches the speed of light as it approaches the event horizon Only relative to static observers, i.e., observers who are hovering at a

> anything falling in approaches the speed of light as it approaches the event horizon Only relative to static observers, i.e., observers who are hovering at a constant altitude above the horizon. But there is no such observer at the horizon, so no observer ever sees the infalling object going past them at the speed of light. > So to external observers they slow down. No, that isn't the reason they appear to slow down to external observers. This is curved spacetime and you can't use your intuitions from Special Relativity, since that is only valid in flat spacetime. The reason the infalling object appears to slow down to an external observer is that the light it emits takes longer and longer to get back out to the external observer, because of the way spacetime is curved. > I think of black holes as onions, everything approaches the event horizon and then (to external observers) get frozen at the edge, until the black hole gets bigger. This view is wrong. Things fall into the hole. They don't pile up at the horizon. They appear to slow down as they approach the horizon, but that is an optical illusion created by the curvature of spacetime.