The epicenter was located near Çaldıran, 20 km northeast of Muradiye, in the Van Province of eastern Turkey.

The overall shortening that affects this area is accommodated partly by thrusting along the Bitlis-Zagros fold and thrust belt and partly by a mixture of sinistral strike-slip on SW-NE trending faults and dextral strike-slip on NW-SE trending faults.

[1][5] No earthquakes with magnitudes of 6 or greater were recorded within 100 km of Çaldıran in the preceding 74 years, possibly explaining why it was considered an area of only intermediate seismic risk (zone 3 out of the five-zone system of seismic risking used in Turkey at the time, with zone 1 being the highest).

[1] Most of the buildings in the epicentral area were constructed of thick walls made from rubble masonry cemented with mud mortar.

The very low resistance to lateral loads of these structures explains why almost all the buildings in Çaldıran collapsed in the earthquake, causing most of the deaths.