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French woman stuck in bathroom for three weeks

French firefighters freed a 69-year-old woman who spent three weeks trapped in her bathroom and whose pleas for help by tapping on pipes were ignored by neighbours, police said on Tuesday.



The woman was found in the toilet of her flat in Epinay-sous-Senart

4:32PM GMT 23 Nov 2010

The woman emerged in a "very weakened" state when rescue workers, alerted by neighbours who were worried because they had not seen her for some time, broke into her home on Friday in the Paris suburb of Epinay-sous-Senart to extricate her.

She had got stuck after the bathroom door lock broke.

The woman, who is recuperating in hospital, survived by drinking warm water from the bathroom tap and at night-time tried to call for help by tapping on piping, police said.

But neighbours in the apartment block said they thought someone was doing home repair work and launched a petition to find out who it was and have it stopped.