locked in my megane!

[ads16v]

Last night I finished work and went to unlock my car (2002 1.4 dynamic 16v). Pressing the button on the fob nothing happened, the car battery was dead as a dodo. I used the emergency key and unlocked the passenger door and climbed in. As it was pouring down I closed the door after me. As I did I heard the lock clunk and that was it, I was locked in. Dead battery meant I couldn't open any door or window. I even climbed into the boot to see if there was an internal release but no!
I tried prising door panels etc off to get to the locks but not a chance. I ended up phoning the missus who came up with the spare key fob and released me with the spare emergency key.
What I would like to know is. Has this happened to anyone else? Is there a way of opening the doors from the inside with a flat battery?
Whilst this may give you a giggle, on the serious side I was locked in on a cold night for 45 minutes! If that was someone elderly or vunerable or with no one to come out to help the outcome could be far worse!

[bones96]

there is a way of opening the boot from inside where the boot lock meets the catch on the bottom panel there is a little grey catch insert a flat bladed screw driver and slide to the left and boot will open

[AlexB]

Look at the bright side - you have a devoted wife and a spare key!

[petepete]

Are you saying if a car battery is damaged in an accident resulting in loss of power there is no way out

[eric]

Can someone confirm this, being locked in in the event of power fail.

I thought the internal door release's were mechanical straight to the lock, and would function without power? Unless it's deadlocked ?

[AlexB]

It is impossible to start the engine if the doors are deadlocked, so the door can be opened from the inside after an accident. I've read somewhere that there exist provisions for automatic unlocking the doors for access from outside, again in case of an accident.

What happened in the described case was the driver unlocking the door when the whole system was already under a critical failure (loss of power), then proceeding with the further two actions (i.e. getting in the car and locking the door), while ignoring the failure. There is a reason why a mechanical key is called an emergency key! I can only guess that the cabin computer lost its power, then regained it again when the door was shut - it "found" a mismatch between its last recorded and current states, took an action to eliminate this inconsistency, and then lost its power again.