First Quarter Moon
First Quarter MoonImage credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio.(large image)

First Quarter in Taurus

First Quarter on . Illuminated surface of the Moon is 54% and growing larger. Lunar cycle is 8 days young.

* The exact date and time of this First Quarter phase is on 14 February 2008 at 03:34 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

Moon rises at noon and sets at midnight. It is visible high in the southern sky in early evening.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon is entering ♉ Taurus

Moon is passing first ∠0° of ♉ Taurus tropical zodiac sector.

Snow Moon after 6 days

Next Full Moon is the Snow Moon of February 2008 after 6 days on 21 February 2008 at 03:31.

Moderate tide

There is medium ocean tide on this date. Sun and Moon gravitational forces are not aligned, but meet at very acute angle, so their combined tidal force is moderate.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1972"

Lunar disc appears visually 1.5% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1972" and ∠1943".

Lunation 100 / 1053

The Moon is 8 days young and navigating through the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 100 of Meeus index or 1053 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.56 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 13 hours and 30 minutes and it is 2 hours and 49 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to decrease with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at perigee (∠0° or ∠360°).

Lunation length longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 46 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 6 hours and 17 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠280°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠280° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠310.8°.

Moon at perigee

Moon is at perigee at 01:07 about 13 days since last apogee on 31 January 2008 at 04:26 in ♏ Scorpio the lunar orbit is going to widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth over the upcoming 13 days until point of next apogee on 28 February 2008 at 01:27 in ♏ Scorpio.

Distance to Moon 370 216 km

This perigee Moon is 370 216 km (230 042 mi) away from Earth. This is the year's farthest perigee of 2008. It is 7 708 km closer than the mean perigee distance, but it is still 140 km further than the closest perigee of 21st century.

Moon before descending node

6 days after ascending node on 7 February 2008 at 21:39 in ♒ Aquarius the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 6 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 20 February 2008 at 20:01 in ♌ Leo.

Moon before northern standstill

11 days since the last southern standstill on 2 February 2008 at 23:33 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-28.025° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next day to face maximum declination of ∠28.043° at the point of next northern standstill on 16 February 2008 at 06:10 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

6 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♒ Aquarius the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 6 days

In 6 days on 21 February 2008 at 03:31 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is going to be in a Full Moon geocentric opposition with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Earth-Moon syzygy alignment.

Lunar calendar

Sources and credits

Parts of this Lunar Calendar are based on Planetary Ephemeris Data Courtesy of Fred Espenak, www.Astropixels.com

Moon phase image credit to NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio, svs.gsfc.nasa.gov