TWO sailors in the Pacific Ocean came across a giant volcanic rock, which could be as big as Manhattan, and it is floating toward Australia.

The pumice raft could probably rescue the struggling Great Barrier Reef by supporting marine life. Global warming has killed half of the reef in the last few years.

The volcanic rock covers 150 kilometers of an area over the water’s surface, which is equivalent to the city of Manhattan. It is also the same size as 20,000 soccer fields. A pumice raft is a rock full of holes and cavities, and is formed after an eruption of the volcano.

The Australian couple sailing across the Pacific were the first to notice the giant rock Aug. 9.

“We entered a total rock rubble slick made up of pumice stones from marble to basketball size. The rubble slick went as far as we could see in the moonlight and with our spotlight,” Michael Hoult and Larissa Brill wrote online Aug. 16.

The same day, NASA Earth Observatory revealed there’s a mass of floating rock.

The volcanic rock is so big that NASA’s space satellite can capture its image from space. Several other sailors have reported the same formation.

“A lot of life... can attach themselves to the pumice and be transported thousands of kilometers away. So it’s a way to renew ecosystems somewhere, but it also can introduce invasive species,” Dr. Jutzeler said.

The biggest coral reef on Earth, the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, is finding it tough to recover from the habitat destruction brought about by rising ocean temperatures. (SD-Agencies)