NEW SCOTLAND — The Albany County Sheriff’s Office coordinated a rope rescue at a 60-foot cliff in John Boyd Thacher State Park on Tuesday night, after, police say, a woman crashed her car against a guardrail, sought help from a nearby residence, then ran away and fell off a cliff.

Erika A. Barkman, 38, of Voorheesville, was rescued while conscious and taken to Albany Medical Center. According to a hospital representative, no information about Barkman was available on Wednesday.

The rescue took two hours, and began after police found the woman’s car just before 9 p.m. The bumper was missing from the front of the vehicle.

An 8:49 p.m. report of an accident led sheriff’s deputies to find a green 1996 Volvo crashed into a guardrail on Thacher Park Road, its front end damaged, said a release from the sheriff's office.

A witness at the scene said the driver had been tailgating and driving erratically before the crash and that she had asked the witness for help in finding her cell phone, the release said.

“The witness stated the operator did not appear to be injured but was stumbling around and then climbed over the guide rail and fled into the woods,” the release said.

The sheriff’s communication center then got a call from a Thacher Park Road resident saying a woman came to his door, asking for help and smelling like alcohol, the release says; she told the resident she was being “chased by cops.”

When sheriff’s deputies arrived at the home, Barkman “fled into the woods,” the release says; a police dog began tracking her from the home through the woods to the edge of a cliff.

“Sheriff’s deputies began yelling Erika’s name and they could hear her calling for help from the bottom of the cliff, but they were unable to see her,” the release says.

The sheriff’s search and rescue unit was then called to lift her from the bottom of the cliff, the release says; once she was found, she was loaded into a rescue basket and hauled back up the cliff.

Barkman was taken to Albany Medical Center by the Onesquethaw Ambulance Squad for non-life-threatening injuries sustained in the fall.

“A lot of lives got put to risk tonight,” said Sheriff Craig Apple at a press conference Tuesday. He said that the police will “find out if alcohol was involved — what exactly was going on — and take it from there.”

On Wednesday, Apple used social media to recognize the rescuers.

“I would like to thank the members of New Salem Fire, Berne Fire, Slingerlands Fire, Guilderland Center Fire, Onesquethaw Fire, Lifenet, The NYSP [New York State Police], and, of course, our own paramedics and members of our search and rescue team, for assisting on the rescue of a 38-year-old female who walked off a 50- to 60-foot cliff last night. Job well done!” Apple tweeted.

Apple described the sheer cliff face as a “straight drop.”

The car crash is still being investigated and officials believe alcohol may have been a contributing factor, the release says. Anyone with information is asked to call the sheriff’s office at (518) 765-2351.