Not only is storm chasing a rabid hobby, but it's a career subject to the same "professional jealousy" as other industry where dollars and reputations are on the line! In, in language we can understand: Opportunities for gossip that's rife scandal!

As a doctored tornado video — supposedly of a Nebraska tornado last week, but more likely of a a Kansas tornado filmed four years ago with some haphazard editing — made the rounds to some 2,000 websites and 60 digital customers through distribution from Associated Press, blame is being thrown about every which way.

The AP blamed Andy Fabel, who they paid $295 for the video, for faking the clip after fellow storm chaser Dan Robinson of Appalachian Skies Media called foul. But Fabel insists the footage isn't doctored, and that he's being accused of faking it because people like Robinson are jealous of his "success."

Fabel told the AP on Thursday that he legitimately filmed the Nebraska storm. He said fellow storm chasers are "jealous of you if you got a tornado that they wanted. They'll pack it up and try to crucify you."

Not that his rebuttal was of any consequence to the AP.

The AP had sent Fabel's video Sunday to nearly 2,000 Web sites that subscribe to the company's Online Video Network, and more than 60 large digital customers that buy AP's online content individually. Upon seeing the evidence, the AP eliminated the video from OVN and contacted its other customers to urge them not to use it, said Kevin Roach, the AP's acting head of domestic broadcast news operations.

"We never want to mislead people," Roach said. "Based on evidence provided to us, we believe that the video was not authentic."

Roach said the AP looked at the two video streams side-by-side, and examined individual frames of the footage in making its determination. He also asked for opinions from a photo editor and third storm chaser, Roach said.

"It was rather definitive for us," he said.

[AP]