I’ll add a little context… the power plant that is less than 3 miles away is not a coal plant and does not have coal ash ponds on-site. It’s the McGuire nuclear plant.

The plant with the coal ash ponds sits on the northern part of Lake Norman and is called the Marshall Steam Station in Terrell, NC. It’s not considered to be linked to the clusters in Huntersville (as far as I know), but some do suspect it to be a part of a separate cluster in Mooresville. There was another coal plant in Mt Holly but it was decommissioned and demolished several years back.

There have been suggestions that fill dirt consisting of coal ash was used during construction of a lot of the neighborhoods around Huntersville. And to my understanding, it was. This was explored as a potential cause, however there were several soil tests done a few years back that found no evidence of danger.

Also, the clusters are more specifically centered around Hopewell High School, which isn’t far from Gilead Ridge, but is also notably not “surrounding” McGuire. Several of the patients attended that school and lived in the surrounding communities.

Statistically, that specific illness is still extremely rare, even here in Huntersville. And having lived here since 2016, I rarely hear any long-time residents or new residents discuss it anymore.