A YOUNG motorcyclist who gives up his time to transport urgently-needed blood supplies and transplant organs between hospitals was attacked on a visit to Bolton.

Niall Miller, who has been an advanced rider for North West Blood Bikes for 12 months and was a controller for six months before that, was left shaken and his relatively new Triumph Tiger 800 damaged after the frightening incident.

Friends from the charity set up a JustGiving page to raise repair funds and in a little over 12 hours the £2,000 target sum had been reached and offers of assistance and replacement parts had flooded in.

Mr Miller, a 21-year-old photography student at Myerscough College whose father Graham is secretary of North West Blood Bikes, was preparing to head home on Monday evening after calling at a friend’s house in Guido Street, Halliwell.

Neil McCall, a family friend and press officer for the charity, said: “It was about 10.50pm and he was visiting a friend in Bolton.

“I think he was probably getting back on his bike when two people approached him and tried to take his bike off him.

“They tried to grab his helmet and keys off him.

“They pushed the bike over and he was not going to allow them to have it.

“They stole the storage box from the back of the bike and ran off.”

Mr Miller was not on duty for the charity at the time but does have the charity’s logo as a sticker on his windshield.

The windshield, the instrument dials and the lights were damaged and he will need to replace the box in order to continue the delivery work.

However, the biking community rallied round instantly when a call went out.

Mr McCall said: “It was round about 8pm on Tuesday the appeal went online and it’s been closed already because it’s reached £2,300.

“To be honest, we’re overwhelmed by the response.

“People with garage space have offered it for him to go and fix the bike and people have offered spare windshields and even to work on the bike to repair the damage for him.”

North West Blood Bikes provides a volunteer-run out-of-hours courier services for the NHS in Greater Manchester by taking blood, plasma, platelets, samples, medication, medical files and donor breast milk between hospitals.

Mr Miller cannot ride any of the charity’s fleet bikes as he is under the insurance age threshold so as well as being off the road he has to be taken off the rota for the timebeing.