HOOSICK FALLS, N.Y. Its been five years since Michael Hickey, sleepless and grieving his fathers untimely death, Googled Teflon and cancer and came to the terrifying realization that his towns water was likely poisoned.

Back then, perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA, was little more than a chemistry textbook tongue twister. It was also the key, nonstick ingredient in the waterproof fabrics made by the factory almost next door to the Hickeys home.

The entire family worked at various points in the plant, owned first by Honeywell International then Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics. Hickey recalled scrubbing the ventilation towers as a young man in little more than light protective gear. Hickeys father was driving a school bus for the town the day he came home and urinated blood, offering the first visible sign of the kidney cancer that would kill him not long after. His death haunted his son. Hickeys father never drank or smoked; he was relatively fit. How could he get cancer?

While he strongly suspected their water was tainted, Hickey couldnt even convince local or state officials to test the water supply for the chemical and ended up doing it himself. The results were definitive: The tiny upstate New York mill towns groundwater contained chemical levels far exceeding the Environmental Protection Agencys health advisory.