An off-duty garda superintendent has been hailed as a hero after he and a number of local people stopped the attempted robbery at the Bank of Ireland at Main Street in the town on Friday afternoon.

One man was arrested at the scene, and a second man, who had initially escaped, was detained by gardai on Friday night.

The botched robbery took place at approximately 3.55pm when two armed men entered the bank and attempted to rob it. It is understood there was a large number of customers in the bank at the time of the raid as local people rushed to use the bank in the last few minutes before it closed its doors for the weekend.

Superintendent Enda Walsh was in the bank on business at the time. Assisted by other customers, he tackled one of the raiders and managed to over-power him before making an arrest.

An imitation firearm was recovered at the scene and a car was located nearby.

The arrested men are both from Dublin and were being detained yesterday at Loughrea Garda station under Section 30 of the Offences Against the State Act.