Sydney, Australia. Scientists have found a massive coral reef, nearly 500 meters tall and 1.5 kilometers wide at the northern tip of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.

The reef is taller than New York’s Empire State Building and the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It lies 40 meters below the ocean surface and about six kilometers from the edge of Great Barrier Reef.

“To find a new half-a-kilometer tall reef in the offshore Cape York area of the well-recognized Great Barrier Reef shows how mysterious the world is just beyond our coastline,” Dr. Jyotika Virmani, executive director of Schmidt Ocean Institute, said in a statement.

Scientists claim it to be the ‘first of its kind’ discovery in more than 100 years.

A team of scientists from James Cook University, led by Dr. Robin Beaman discovered the reef on October 20 when they were 3D mapping  the sea floor in that area of the Great Barrier Reef. “We are surprised and elated by what we have found,” said Beaman. He said that it was thriving with a “blizzard of fish” in a healthy ecosystem.

The Great Barrier Reef is the world’s largest coral reef and is home to more than 1,500 species of fish, 411 species of hard corals and dozens of other species. It has experienced heavy damages in the form of coral deaths and dispersal of marine creatures in recent years.