I lived in California for a while where I taught kids about earthquakes at the Birch Aquarium at Scripps. Fault lines and tectonic plates were familiar terms to people out there, as were the feelings of the floor rumbling and bookshelves shaking. But here in Maine, those are not such common words or sensations. Last week, however, there were three earthquakes back to back — and all of them happened offshore, underwater.

The quakes all centered about 10 miles off the shores of York Harbor. The waters closer to shore are familiar to me from graduate school as a site we commonly used for SCUBA training. But we certainly weren’t diving 10 miles offshore and we weren’t diving in water that was 8 miles deep. I wondered, however, what it would be like to be underwater during an earthquake. If people felt this quake as far south as Connecticut, then certainly there must have been impacts on the marine environment and the creatures that live there.

Earthquakes impact marine life in a variety of ways. These can include literally shaking sediment loose from the seafloor, making the water more cloudy. It can be just sediment in some cases but can also include breaking up seafloor habitat in others. In deep water, this habitat can include surprisingly colorful species like corals — something you don’t expect to find in cold waters. Because these are “fixed” creatures, they can’t move when things shake but rather stand to be dislocated from their habitat. For the mobile and more sensory creatures, the seismic waves can result in changes in pressure. This is something that many fish and marine mammals are very sensitive to and use for hearing and for navigation. The changes in pressure may temporarily scramble these senses. The biggest impact of an earthquake underwater can be a tsunami. This is a giant wave that is generated by the upheaval of the seafloor. However, the size of the quakes in Maine were not strong enough to create a tsunami.

The first quake, which occurred on Jan. 27, was a 3.8 on the Richter scale. This is in the “moderate range,” where there generally is no damage to structures. The quakes that we have in Maine are predominantly in this lower range. That’s because we are not on a fault line here. Instead, the earthquakes are caused by a buildup of pressure as the land mass moves on top of the North American Tectonic Plate. Underneath the ocean are an ancient set of mountains that now comprise the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. The pressure in the ocean is slowly pushing it towards the coast, and that can result in small quakes.

Maine geologists predict one to two earthquakes per year in this lower-impact range. There is only a 2% chance of a significant earthquake over a typical 50-year period, according to the Maine Geological Survey. But while a low-impact earthquake here is not something unusual, having three in a week when one to two per year is the norm is rare. That’s what happened last week with the first one followed by one on Wednesday and then another just this past Sunday — all in the same area. These were likely aftershocks, which are caused as the displaced seafloor resettles.

I did not feel the impact of any of the three quakes, but it did make me wonder what that combined impact might have had on the seafloor and the creatures that live there. I’ll be curious to see how this area might be studied going forward to see how it might be reshaped as it resettles. In the meantime, it is interesting to imagine what all of that might look and feel like 8 miles below the surface.

Susan Olcott is the director of strategic partnerships at Maine Coast Fishermen’s Association.