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

The woman emerged in a "very weakened" state when rescue workers, alerted by neighbors worried because they had not seen her for some time, broke into her home 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 neighbors 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.