Caused by a shallow thrust fault on or near the Flores Back Arc Thrust, at which the Australia and Sunda plates underthrusts the Indonesian volcanic island arcs, the earthquake struck just a week after the magnitude 6.4 earthquake which had killed 20. According to BMKG, this earthquake was a foreshock to the 6.9 earthquake. Despite the earthquake, no increase in activity was recorded for the nearby volcanoes of Rinjani and Agung. At certain areas in the northwestern parts of the island, the earthquake caused the ground to rise by as much as .