[2][3] Niigata Prefecture is located in the Hokuriku region of Honshu, the largest island of Japan.

The initial earthquake had a magnitude of 6.6 and caused noticeable shaking across almost half of Honshu, including parts of the Tōhoku, Hokuriku, Chūbu, and Kantō regions.

[1] For comparison, the Great Hanshin earthquake, which devastated much of Kobe, measured 7 on the shindo scale, with a magnitude of 7.3.

During the first 116 hours, 15 earthquakes with intensities of shindo 5− or higher rocked the Chuetsu region.

[13] Eight out of ten cars of the Toki 325 service (a 200 Series Shinkansen train) derailed on the Joetsu Shinkansen line between Nagaoka Station in Nagaoka and Urasa Station in Yamato; no injuries were reported among the 155 passengers.

On December 27, 2004, service resumed on all remaining parts of the Joetsu and Iiyama Lines reopened.

The cellular telephone system suffered from direct damage to relay stations, as well as depletion of battery back-up power supplies in as little as a day.

On April 1, 2007, the directive to evacuate five settlements in the former village of Yamakoshi (later part of the city of Nagaoka) was lifted.

Notable recent ones include a large quake on June 16, 1964 that had a magnitude of 7.5, killing 28, where major liquefaction had occurred and tsunami destroyed the port of Niigata city.

There was also the 2007 Chūetsu offshore earthquake, both striking shortly after major typhoons passed by, causing complications.