With financial losses of around US$1 million, damage was considered minimal, with one death and forty injuries.

The San Andreas Fault System (SAFS) is a collection of faults that accommodates differential motion between the Pacific and North American plates and extends from the Mendocino triple junction in the north to the Salton Sea in the south.

It was found to be dissimilar from the strike-slip movement of the 1906 earthquake, and instead showed oblique movement on a steeply-dipping thrust fault, with the eastern side of the fault rising relative to the western side.

The most significant effects were seen in the western portion of Daly City and in the Lake Merced area of San Francisco.

The minimal losses were attributed to the short duration and lack of high intensity shaking.