NASA: Hottest June on record continues 14-month global heat wave

By Ben Westcott, CNN

Updated 0721 GMT (1521 HKT) July 20, 2016

The consequences of climate change go far beyond warming temperatures, which scientists say are melting the polar ice caps and raising sea levels. Click through the gallery for a look at 10 other key effects of climate change, some of which may surprise you.
Photos: Effects of global warming around the world
Melting polar ice caps – The consequences of climate change go far beyond warming temperatures, which scientists say are melting the polar ice caps and raising sea levels. Click through the gallery for a look at 10 other key effects of climate change, some of which may surprise you.
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In the coming decades climate change will unleash megadroughts lasting 10 years or more, according to <a href="http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00282.1" target="_blank">a new report</a> by scholars at Cornell University, the University of Arizona and the U.S. Geological Survey. We're seeing hints of this already in many arid parts of the world and even in California, which has been rationing water amid record drought. In this 2012 photo, a man places his hand on parched soil in the Greater Upper Nile region of northeastern South Sudan.
Photos: Effects of global warming around the world
Drought – In the coming decades climate change will unleash megadroughts lasting 10 years or more, according to a new report by scholars at Cornell University, the University of Arizona and the U.S. Geological Survey. We're seeing hints of this already in many arid parts of the world and even in California, which has been rationing water amid record drought. In this 2012 photo, a man places his hand on parched soil in the Greater Upper Nile region of northeastern South Sudan.
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There's not a direct link between climate change and wildfires, exactly. But many scientists believe the increase in wildfires in the Western United States is partly the result of tinder-dry forests parched by warming temperatures. This photo shows a wildfire as it approaches the shore of Bass Lake, California, in mid-September.
Photos: Effects of global warming around the world
Wildfires – There's not a direct link between climate change and wildfires, exactly. But many scientists believe the increase in wildfires in the Western United States is partly the result of tinder-dry forests parched by warming temperatures. This photo shows a wildfire as it approaches the shore of Bass Lake, California, in mid-September.
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Scientists say the oceans' temperatures <a href="http://blog.nature.org/science/2014/03/31/ipcc-coral-reefs-science-climate-change/" target="_blank">have risen by more than 1 degree Fahrenheit</a> over the last century. It doesn't sound like much, but it's been enough to affect the fragile ecosystems of coral reefs, which have been bleaching and dying off in recent decades. This photo shows dead coral off the coast of St. Martin's Island in Bangladesh.
Photos: Effects of global warming around the world
Coral reefs – Scientists say the oceans' temperatures have risen by more than 1 degree Fahrenheit over the last century. It doesn't sound like much, but it's been enough to affect the fragile ecosystems of coral reefs, which have been bleaching and dying off in recent decades. This photo shows dead coral off the coast of St. Martin's Island in Bangladesh.
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