RALSTON — For nearly three hours on Friday, about two dozen emergency responders searched very rugged terrain, accessible only by foot or all-terrain vehicles, near the McIntyre-McNett township line, trying to locate the source of an activated emergency signal that the county’s 911 center first received about 4:30 p.m.

“We didn’t know what it was at first. We were initially dispatched to the 5000 block of Rock Run Road for an unknown problem,” Ralston Fire Chief John Orr said, adding that the responders were kind of “holding their breath,” trying to find out who was in trouble, what the problem was “and were we going to locate them before dark.”

The signal was coming from two female hikers, one of whom had suffered a twisted ankle when she fell on some rocks, Orr said. Four search teams, two on foot and two on ATVs, spent considerable time covering a wide area near an old loggers hiking trail as well as Yellow Dog and Rock Run roads before Ralston Assistant Chief Joe Engel found the two women about 7:15 p.m.

Except for the sore ankle, the two were fine, Orr said.

“Until we actually had contact with the patient, we didn’t know how serious the situation really was. It could have been any number of things from someone with a snakebite to a cardiac problem,” Orr said.

The women, believed to be in their 30s and from the Canton area, were transported via the ATVs to Yellow Dog Road, where a command post had been set up. It took about another hour to get out of the woods to the command post. The women had a GPS-type tracking device with them, Orr said. The woman with the injured ankle declined treatment.

Assisting Ralston and Trout Run firefighters were paramedics from Loyalsock Township, state police and the state Department of Conservation and Recreation.