Statistic estimation of the maximum possible earthquake magnitude for the Baikal Rift Zone

The Bayesian approach is used to estimate main seismic parameters: M-max - maximum possible regional magnitude; lambda - seismic-activity rate; and b - slope of the plot for the magnitude frequency law. The suggested method a llows one to use catalogs with varying lower magnitude completeness thresho ld as well as historical catalogs. The quantiles of M-max(T) are estimated, where M-max(T) is the maximum magnitude of an earthquake that will occur i n a future time interval T. Also, the magnitude uncertainties (standard dev iations) are established. The method is applied to estimate M-max and M-max (T) in Baikal Rift Zone. This estimation gives M-max = = 8.07 +/- 0.47.