'Missing' woman found in hospital

PARIS - A young Frenchwoman, severely shocked by the attack on the World Trade Center in New York, was finally located in hospital by her family last week after being listed as "missing" for two weeks.

The woman, in her late 20s and named only as Alexandra, was in her apartment close to the twin towers when they collapsed on September 11.

Although not injured physically, she was taken to hospital suffering from extreme shock and failed to contact her family.

She was finally located last Monday, 13 days after the attack, after the French consulate in Paris had circulated her description to all hospitals in the New York area.

Her mother travelled from Toulon to New York last week to be reunited with the daughter who she feared had died.

"The more days that passed, the more we were overcome with grief," her grandmother, Marie, told the newspaper Le Parisien. "Then we got a telephone call from the American consulate in Marseille and we exploded with joy.

"On September 11, she was in her apartment a couple of steps from the World Trade Center. She saw everything - the flames, the falling bodies, the collapsing towers.

"She was brought out uninjured but severely, psychologically shocked."

Alexandra, who had been working in the fashion industry in New York for two years, is said to be recovering since her mother's arrival in America.

Four French people are known to have died, and another six are missing, believed dead, in the collapse of the towers.

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