Two bystanders tackled a woman to the ground after she allegedly wielded a machete to hold up a packed supermarket on Sydney’s north shore on Tuesday evening.

A 31-year-old woman has been charged after she allegedly threatened staff with the machete during the alleged robbery, before fleeing and being restrained by witnesses to the incident.

Staff at the supermarket in Neutral Bay reportedly confronted the woman when she started stealing items from a service counter at about 6.30pm Tuesday, police have reported.

A witness, Nick, told The Sydney Morning Herald that the woman had first ordered staff to open the tills and became angry when she discovered that they could not be.

“She was going from till to till to till, until she worked out she actually couldn’t get any of them open … she actually cornered one of the young attendants in one of the actual checkout aisles,” he reportedly said.

Nick said he and another man, Victor, agreed to try and stop the woman after she had exited the supermarket.

“I grabbed her from behind in a big bear hug and kind of lifted her off the ground as much as I could,” Nick told the paper.

“He [Victor] ran in from the right-hand side, grabbed both of her hands. He must have put pressure on her wrist or something like that, got the machete off her and threw it away.

“Then I’ve literally lifted her off the ground and placed her on the ground gently — not really.

“And then we just kind of held her until the cops came. By that time we could already hear sirens.”

The woman has been charged with several offences including larceny, assault and being armed with intent to rob and is due to face Central Local Court on Wednesday.

A witness’s footage of the alleged robbery

Woman charged with strew of offences after allegedly robbing a Neutral Bay supermarket armed with a machete. #9News https://t.co/yjJY2i7HVu

— 9News Sydney (@9NewsSyd) October 18, 2016