yeah i just took a look at that cell - good lord. Luckily it's going over an area that is mostly sparsely populated (as long as it stays a good deal west of I-81).
at least by the 1990s, the heat index was definitely something communicated pretty routinely in local news etc, at least in these parts. Not sure what you mean by "preferred narrative" aside from stating obvious facts about now versus in the past.