A woman has been shot by police at a Far North Queensland hotel.

Police were called to the West End Hotel on Ingham Road, in Townsville about 5.30pm on Tuesday following reports a woman had been brandishing a knife and making threats.

Queensland Police told Daily Mail Australia the woman ‘came’ at officers while armed with the weapon.

A police officer discharged their weapon and shot the woman.

She was hit in the abdomen and officers provided fist aid on the scene.

Paramedics then arrived and she was transported by ambulance to hospital.

A crime scene has been cordoned off and an investigation has commenced. 

Witnesses heard an officer tell a woman to stop before she ignored this command and stepped forward with a knife. 

The witness said they then heard a gunshot. 

‘I was no more than three or four metres. I was very close,’ another witness, Joanne Aldous, told The Courier Mail.

‘I just heard the police telling her to stop, telling her to stop, then the gun shot.

‘I heard police telling her to stop, she had a knife – like a carving knife or something, and she kept moving towards the female cop and then they shot.’

Police cordoned off the beer garden but patrons could reportedly still be seen inside the pub following the incident.

The shooting comes just three months after Queensland Police shot dead a wanted man near a Gold Coast college.