A group of farm workers in India were stunned when what appeared to be a meteorite crashed down in the rice paddy they were tending.

The object left a large crater where it landed.

"Agriculture laborers working the paddy field where the meteorite struck claimed that they saw a fireball-like object coming down from the sky and made a deep crater where it hit the ground," a local official told the Times of India. "The farmers also saw smoke coming out from the spot in the water-filled agriculture field (where it landed)."

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The rock, which was about the size of a football and estimated to weigh around 33 pounds, is being sent to the nation's science and technology department for confirmation of its origin.

Meteorites are pieces of meteoroids, which themselves are pieces of asteroids or other space rocks, according to NASA. Meteoroids burn up when they hit Earth's atmosphere at high speed, producing what's known as "shooting stars."

Most meteorites that are found range in size from a pebble to a fist, NASA says. They usually have a shiny, burned exterior and magnetic properties.

Finding a meteorite – let alone seeing one fall from the sky and hit the ground – is rare. According to the most recent numbers from the international Meteoritical Society database, 1,821 confirmed meteorites have been found in the U.S. since 1802.