The depth and focal mechanism solutions of the event are consistent with its occurrence on the subduction zone interface between these plates, approximately 90 km northeast of the Middle America Trench.

In 1932, a M 8.4 megathrust earthquake struck in the region of Jalisco, several hundred kilometers to the northwest of the Oaxaca event.

The deadliest nearby earthquake occurred on September 19, 1985, in the Michoacán region 500 km to the northwest of the February 16th event.

[5] Alejandro Murat Hinojosa, the Governor of Oaxaca, was in Tuxtepec at the time the earthquake struck and immediately left to survey the damage in Pinotepa Nacional with Alfonso Navarrete Prida, who had become the Secretary of the Interior the month before.

[6][7] The Sikorsky UH-60M Black Hawk military helicopter in which Murat and Navarrete, along with the state head of civil protection and one other person, were traveling, crashed in Santiago Jamiltepec while attempting to land nearby when the pilot lost control of the aircraft.