Mom Had No Idea She Was Pregnant Until She Gave Birth. Then a Cop Saved Her Daughter’s Life

"God puts you in a place for a reason," Indianapolis officer Kelly Chappell said of saving the newborn's life

An Indianapolis police officer is being praised for saving the life of a premature baby whose mom had no idea she was even pregnant.

In bodycam footage. Kelly Chappell of the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department can be seen quickly running into a home and grabbing the newborn from a woman, who said she was unaware that she was expecting. Chappell then gives the tiny girl quick chest compressions.

The officer tells PEOPLE she managed to get two gasps of air out of the baby, which came as such a relief.

 "This baby is going to have a chance," she remembers thinking at that moment. "It's really more of a miracle."

A 19-year-veteran of the department, Chappell, 47, says her training and instincts kicked in the moment she arrived on the scene.

"I felt for a pulse — couldn't feel anything. She had a bluish tint," says the officer, who immediately began administering CPR by using two fingers to press on the baby's chest. The body-cam video also shows Chappell sweeping her finger into the newborn's mouth and pulling out a small amount of a sticky-looking fluid that the baby may have swallowed during the delivery.

Related: Mich. Officer Saves Baby Who Stopped Breathing During Traffic Stop: 'Nothing Short of Heroic'

She continued her lifesaving efforts for about eight minutes before handing the baby off to paramedics, who then took her to the hospital.

"You want to make everything possible for that parent," says Chappell, who credits the mother for taking all the right steps after unexpectedly giving birth at home.

The woman was in the bathroom when the child was born at what was later determined to be 23 to 26 weeks of gestation and weighing about 2 lbs., Chappell tells PEOPLE. The mother cut the umbilical cord, wrapped the baby in a purple shirt and kept patting the newborn to try to get her breathing.

"I told her, 'You did exactly what you need to do to keep your daughter alive,' " says Chappell, who is herself a mother of two teens and a stepmother to an adult daughter — and the officer says she still keeps an old poster inside her cabinet at home outlining how to do CPR on kids if they choke.

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The officer says it's not unusual for people to not know they are pregnant right away. She herself didn't know she was pregnant for about four months with one of her own children.

"I didn't know for quite a while," Chappell remembers. "Not everybody feels their child move."

Related: Officer Saves Baby Who 'Was Not Breathing' After Seeing Car Run Red Light: 'He’s a Hero,' Says Dad

The mother is now doing well and her baby is continuing to recover in the hospital, says Chappell, who adds that the baby's middle name is, appropriately enough, a Spanish word for "miracle."

"God puts you in a place for a reason," she notes. "Every day you're just thankful the baby made it another day."

Chappell received an award from the police department for her work. "We are incredibly proud of Officer Kelly Chappell's lifesaving efforts," IMPD spokesman Tommy Thompson says. "Her efforts ensured that baby could breathe another day."