A bike ride and a quick second look changed everything for one woman in eastern Iowa.

Two 13-year-old boys in Fruitland, in Muscatine County, are being praised after they found an elderly woman injured in her yard on June 9, after she had been there for more than 16 hours, according to local station KWQC.

Gunner Skidmore said he had started his morning eating a Pop-Tart and scrolling social media when his best friend, Kohen Chick, asked him to ride bikes. The boys headed to a local trail near some houses, and then noticed something unusual.

“I went to the trail and Kohen was like, ‘You see that lady back there?’ ” Skidmore told KWQC. “Then, we went back and looked, and it took a little while to find her.”

They found a woman who appeared to have fallen on her property.

“I said, ‘Hey ma’am, are you okay?’ She was like, ‘Yeah, I need help. Call 911,’ ” Skidmore said.

Skidmore said he called his mother, who came to the scene and called emergency services.

“She showed up pretty fast and then my mom called 911,” Skidmore told KWQC. “[The elderly woman] didn’t have her phone or water or anything. She was there for like 16-plus hours.”

The boys said the woman told them she had been outside since about 5 p.m. the previous evening.

“She was scared,” Chick told the outlet. “You could just tell because like her face, she was covered in all these bugs and stuff.”

The teens believe the woman fell while feeding her horse. They said she told them she had rolled from her backyard to the front yard trying to get help.

“A few more hours and she definitely like wouldn’t have made it,” Skidmore told KWQC.

KWQC reported that the woman was taken by ambulance to a hospital in nearby Muscatine for treatment.

A spokesperson for the Muscatine County Sheriff’s Office told PEOPLE that the boys were given a special award on June 15 by Muscatine County emergency management director Christopher Jasper.

“Today, I would like to recognize the extraordinary actions of two young men whose quick thinking and compassion helped save a life in Muscatine County,” Jasper said during the award ceremony, according to an excerpt of the speech obtained by PEOPLE.

“Without the prompt actions of Gunner and Kohen, the outcome could have been tragic. Their awareness, compassion, and willingness to help a person in need undoubtedly made a difference and may very well have saved her life,” Jasper added.

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