Just to see if someone can enlighten me with something

i recently read an article regarding the 'big rip' which stated initially galaxies would be torn apart followed by stars and planets and eventually all matter. It stated this would happen over a reasonable lenght of time.

so for instance if the galaxy was ripped what would be the contents of this rip? ie could you go through this. what energy would this be. Would the rip itself reproduce the initial stages of the universe. I struggle to getmy head around one part of a galaxy coming to a stop followed by something that has been ripped.

thanks for your input in advance 

This is speculation that one possible fate of the universe is that the effects of dark energy will increase to the point where gravity and dark matter are no longer sufficient to hold large-scale objects (galaxies, galaxy clusters, and galaxy superclusters) together.

If you extrapolate from the currently observed acceleration to the expansion of the universe, one scenario is that it would continue apace and within a few billion years a Big Rip would begin to "shred" these larger structures.

If you Google "big rip galaxy" you will find several articles on this idea.