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Tekamah Nebraska August 17, 2001      The forecast for this day called for a chance of strong to severe storms as a cold front swept through the area. Throughout the afternoon cumulus clouds began to develop in our area. I knew that the atmosphere was starting to get stirred up, denoted by towering cumulus building.      I soon found that a storm had developed in Dixon county in NE Nebraska - movement was south-southeast. Since the storm was moving down the Missouri River, we gathered up our equipment and decided to intercept the storm near Tekamah Nebraska.       Travelling through the back highways of western Washingtion county, we were witness to a massive supercell anvil with a wall cloud easily visible from some 20+ miles away. We drove into Herman Nebraska so that we could travel north on Highway 75 toward Tekamah. Reports verified that the storm was indeed headed in our direction and it had also produced a tornado which heavily damaged the town of Jackson Nebraska.      As we approached Tekamah, the storm began dropping 2 strong funnels which were very persistent. We lost visibility of the funnel clouds as we passed through Tekamah, but the storm was about to feed us the main course. Coming out of town, we were thrilled to find a rope style tornado was just touching the ground. Realizing that we probably couldn't get a better place to film, we pulled off the highway. We were quickly joined by many curious passers-by.      For nearly 8 minutes, we stared in awe as the beautiful white rope slowly danced across the countryside. Once the tornado had disappeared, we moved farther north and took up position directly west of the storm. At this point the textbook wall cloud began to wrap up like a wheel. Many funnel clouds dipped in and out of the angry mass of rotation, but incredibly, none touched the ground.      We crossed the Missouri River at Decatur and pursued the storm south on Interstate 29. As it moved across western Iowa, it put on a magnificent lightning display; but, with the sun setting and our fuel supply running out, it was time to make our way home, mission accomplished. P.S. We found out that many small towns in that area -- that are as far from civilization as you can get -- don't have a gas station open past 8:00P.M. :-(