The 49-year-old woman fell ill late on Sunday but was too large to be carried down the winding stairs of her apartment building in the northern town of Bruay-sur-l'Escaut. It took 30 firemen six hours to extract her from the second-floor flat.
"After 28 years with the fire department, it's the first time I have taken part in this kind of operation. We even had to dismantle part of the window to evacuate the patient," said a Bruay fire service official.