These three men have now emerged as heroes – for tackling the crèche knifeman.
And one of them even received a phone call from French President Emmanuel Macron – for his role in taking down the attacker. French native Alan Loren-Guille who is just 17, helped disarm the attacker as he carried out his gruesome attack on Gaelscoil Cholaiste Mhuire on Dublin’s Parnell Square at 1.30pm on Thursday.
And Spitalfields, where he is a trainee, also paid tribute to him last night. The restaurant posted on social media: "This is our own 17 year old super hero Alan Loren-Guille who was one of the brave heroes that managed to disarm the school children attacker yesterday in Dublin on his way to work.
Read more: Principal of Gaelscoil Cholaiste Mhuire asks for privacy after shock stabbing
Read more: Mum whose family witnessed Parnell Square stabbing fears kids will 'never un-see' horror attack
"He is one of our brilliant French stagiaires in the kitchen @spitalfields_dublin. He noticed something happening as he passed by and selflessly jumped in to stop the attacker and managed to wrestle the knife off him. He was fairly unscathed but for a couple a cuts to his hand and face.
"Without this act of bravery who knows what else might have happened. Our prayers are with the poor children, families and teachers who were affected by this tragedy. Please lookout for one and other. Not all superheroes wear capes."
Another hero was Wicklow man Warren Donohoe, from Baltinglass, who was in town with family to celebrate the 11th birthday of their daughter Abigail, who is autistic. Warren grabbed the man – while brave Abigail ran to raise the alarm.
Abigail’s mam Stacey Power, who witnessed everything with her three other young daughters and her mother Bernie, told Dublin Live: "I saw what looked like a woman and a man fighting across the road. And I said to the kids, come close and stand beside me.
"And then I just, I saw him just grabbing the child and stabbing her." She continued: "I screamed, I said, 'Warren, he’s stabbing her! He's stabbing the child.' And Warren ran straight across the road. He didn't even think.
"I was trying to get the baby out of the pram. And my mam's partner ran across as well. He fell in the middle of the road running, trying to get over to help.
"Warren was attacking the man, pulling the man away from the child. And then the Brazilian man came, his bike fell and he came over."
That's when Stacey turned around to check on her children. The traumatised mother said: "I couldn't find her so I was screaming. I thought that she was dead somewhere. I was screaming, 'please someone help me find my baby'. Help me find my baby."
Abigail had apparently run as soon as she saw the child getting stabbed. Stacey was unable to locate her daughter for half an hour which she spent screaming for Abigail, as she feared for her safety in the immediate aftermath of the horrifying incident.
However, Stacey said: "She had run the whole way around the block into the Rotunda hospital and screamed, ‘we need ambulances, we need doctors, we need nurses. Please, the kids are getting stabbed, help the kids’.
"She has autism and I don’t know how she even thought to go… I don't even know how she knew the hospital was here because she hadn't been in Dublin in that long.
"She said, I remember that you told me I was born in that hospital. I knew that there’s doctors and nurses in there."
And Brazilian delivery driver Caio Benicio did not have "time to be afraid" when he bravely jumped in to knock the Parnell Square attacker with his helmet after he witnessed the horror attack unfold in Dublin on Thursday.
The 43-year-old Brazilian delivery driver told the Irish Mirror that he has been in Ireland for around one year, moving here after his restaurant burnt down, leaving his family in Brazil to earn money in Ireland to support them.
Caio recently injured himself while playing football in Brazil but still heroically jumped into action to save the children and teacher who had come under attack on Thursday, recounting the moment he stepped in to help, the delivery man said he initially thought the attack was a fight.
"I work as a delivery driver. Yesterday I was working as a normal day when I came here to Parnell Square," Caio explained.
"I was passing by in my motorcycle and I saw, first I thought it was a fight, with a man and a woman, later on, I found out she was a teacher. She was very very brave. I have to tell that.
"I thought it was strange, there was another girl involved who was pulling the girl and I saw the man grab a girl and when I saw the knife, I just acted in an instant.
"I saw him stab the girl in the chest many times, that moment I could not see how bad it was because she was wearing a lot of clothes, and I couldn’t see blood.
"I took off my helmet to protect myself and use it as a weapon and I hit him in the head and then he fell on the ground."
He added: "I am here praying the little girl survives, I don’t have much news from her now. She is in the hospital."
The brave delivery man said he did not hear a word from the attacker, just screaming from teachers and kids.
"I didn’t hear a word from him, after that, I went to the garda station where they asked if I thought he was a terrorist or something, but I didn’t hear anything from him, there was a lot of screaming from the teachers and kids, from him I didn’t hear a word."
The Brazilian man added that when you see a man with a knife, "you don’t have time to be afraid".
"When you see a man with a knife and a little girl, she is five years old I think, you don’t have time to be afraid. I don’t want to make myself a hero. I think everyone who has got a kid would do the same. You don’t have time to be afraid."
Speaking about the violence that erupted in the city on Thursday evening, Caio said: "It doesn’t make any sense".
"I am not the right person to talk about politics here, I am just here one year so I don’t know what is going on. I think there are too many things going on around the world. I think it doesn’t make sense, they are protesting about foreign people, about immigrants and I am an immigrant myself and I was the one to help.
"I think that doesn’t make sense, I think it was a small group of people and they got the excuse to do what they did and for me, it doesn’t make sense at all."
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