This paper presents a methodology to detect and locate damages and faults in orthotropic plate structures. A specific damage index based on dynamic mode shapes of the damaged and undamaged structures has been introduced. The governing differential equation on transverse deformation, the transverse shear force equations and the invariant expression for the sum of transverse loading of an orthotropic plate are employed to obtain the aforementioned damage indices. The validity of the proposed methodology for isotropic and orthotropic damage states is demonstrated using a numerical example. It is shown that the algorithm is able to detect damages for both isotropic and orthotropic damage states acceptably.