Support Mike Holoway’s Recovery Following London Attack

On the morning of Wednesday 18th December, 2024 my husband Mike Holoway was the victim of an unprovoked violent attack in South East London resulting in him losing the sight in his right eye.

Whilst sitting in traffic on his way to work on Woolwich Manor Way, a transit van which had been spotted driving erratically minutes before, pulled alongside Mike’s van. The attacker got out and attempted to open Mike’s driver door, screaming and shouting, but it was locked. He then proceeded to smash through the window with a metal object, throwing Mike across to the passenger seat, his head and face taking the full force of the blow.

The traffic then began to move, spooking the assailant to jump back in his van and speed off. The man in the vehicle behind Mike was witness to the whole attack and was kind enough to guide him to a safe area to pull in and check him over.

As soon as I got the phone call, I dropped everything and got on a train to London. With ambulance wait times being lengthy it was decided the best thing to do was drive him to our local A&E in Essex. After 7 hours of tests and scans, the severity of damage to his right eye became apparent and it was determined that he needed to be under the care of Moorfields Eye Hospital in London.

The following day Mike had surgery to save his eye which thankfully was successful. He now has six sutures holding the eye together, keeping it stable. There will be a further 3 operations and physio over the next nine months and it is only after this that we will find out how much sight he will regain.

We are both self employed and with Mike unable to work, drum, perform, drive - he has had to cancel gigs, turndown future bookings and castings which means we are facing a very uncertain year ahead financially. All of our savings were used to get us through the Covid Pandemic and so we have turned to GoFund me in the hopes that we will be able to raise funds to help cover some of the mortgage, bills and the loss of income.

In a matter of seconds, Mike’s life was turned upside down and over this past month, between several trips to Moorfields for appointments and check ups, the gravity of the situation has started to sink in and at times it is overwhelming, made all the more frustrating finding out that within 3 weeks of this happening, the Met Police closed the GBH case due to there being no cctv in the area so there is no way of tracking the attacker - it is deeply unfair that justice won’t be served.

Mike is strong, has a wonderfully supportive family and a fantastic team of consultants looking after him so we know he will get there. His main focus needs to be recovering and healing from this truly awful experience and the next three operations without the worry and stress of financial pressures caused by this. He shouldn’t be thinking of or trying to return to work before he is fit and able to, resulting in an even longer recovery time.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read all of this. It goes without saying that we really would appreciate any donations made but we also understand that times are tough for so many right now so simply sharing this on social media platforms would be a huge help as well.

Thank you again, Emma & Mike xXx