That’s helpful, thanks. So basically:
1) It’s pretty clear that if this verified or even if we saw heights of 594-597dm we’d have a significant heat wave (while the heights are historic to near historic in their own right) but by itself it’s not enough for a truly historic 3 day 99+ high heat wave because as you said the other day it’d take time for the heights to expand and fill (?). That results in a sort of step ladder increase in daily highs so rather than 99, 99, 101 it’s more 92, 93, 95.
2) For historic potential, we really should see anomalously warm 850mb temperatures eject from the SW to our area. So far, guidance has been lukewarm on balance about it.
This is a snapshot of Wednesday. Obviously the nuclear 850s in the desert SW would moderate our way but we need ~22-25°C for the big temps and can get them on our historic days.
3) For now some of the guidance ejects the highest 850s to our west, but the euro does try to pull in some higher numbers later in the week.
4) GFS still brings big heat on lower 850s, but that’s more dubious as over mixing could limit true high temperature potential.
Is that the gist of it? Do we also care about 700 or 925mb temps?