The United States has broken yet another heat record, with the first six months of 2012 now officially the hottest ever recorded in the continental U.S. in a calendar year. The past 12 months have also been the hottest in recorded history, beating out the record for the previous 12 months. In the last two weeks of June alone, more than 170 all-time heat records were either broken or tied. Blistering heat and drought have fueled record wildfires, damaged the nation’s corn crop and killed scores of people. The fires have consumed 1.3 million acres, the second-biggest area to burn during any June on record. While the Great Plains are facing the worst drought in a quarter century, drenching rains in Florida made last month the wettest June on record there. As the Midwest and East get a respite from the heat, storms are now predicted across swaths of the country, from the Mid-Atlantic to the southern Rockies. Climate experts have described the recent spate of extreme weather as a preview of the planet’s long-term future under global warming.