How Lightning Feeds the Earth

When lightning streaks across the sky, it does more than light up the night. Every second, around 44 flashes of lightning light up skies somewhere on Earth, and each one carries a hidden gift for life below. How does a blast of raw electricity become fertilizer for the soil?

A locked treasure. Plants need nitrogen to grow, and our air is full of it; nitrogen makes up about 78% of every breath you take. But this nitrogen comes in pairs of atoms locked together by one of the strongest chemical bonds in nature. Plants can't break those bonds, so they can starve for nitrogen while surrounded by it.

Breaking the lock. A lightning bolt heats the air to around 50,000°F, about five times hotter than the surface of the Sun. That intense heat splits nitrogen molecules apart, freeing the atoms to join with oxygen. The new compounds dissolve in raindrops and fall to the ground as nitrates, a form of nitrogen plants can readily absorb. The same storm that makes the fertilizer delivers it.

A partner underground. Lightning isn't working alone. Tiny bacteria in the soil, many living in the roots of plants like beans and peas, unlock nitrogen too, and they actually do most of the work. Sky and soil, two completely different systems, share the same essential job.

When a fierce bolt of lightning and a microscopic soil bacterium both work to feed the world's plants, it's hard to see it as an accident. It speaks of a Creator's incredible design and creativity.