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

Waning Gibbous in Sagittarius

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 96% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 16 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the evening and sets in the morning. It is visible to the southwest and it is high in the sky after midnight.

Moon phases on nearby dates

Slide horizontally to discover the moon phase on nearby dates.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon is entering ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is passing first ∠0° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 1 day on 25 April 2013 at 19:57.

Pink Moon before 1 day

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2013 after 27 days on 25 May 2013 at 04:25.

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 ∠1963"

Lunar disc appears visually 2.9% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1963" and ∠1906".

Lunation 164 / 1117

The Moon is 16 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 164 of Meeus index or 1117 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.62 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 14 hours and 53 minutes and it is 35 minutes shorter than the upcoming lunation's length. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to increase with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at apogee (∠180°).

Lunation length longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 2 hours and 9 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 54 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠110.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠110.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠143.3°.

Moon at perigee

Moon is at perigee at 19:48 about 11 days since last apogee on 15 April 2013 at 22:21 in ♊ Gemini the lunar orbit is going to widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth over the upcoming 16 days until point of next apogee on 13 May 2013 at 13:31 in ♊ Gemini.

Distance to Moon 362 268 km

This perigee Moon is 362 268 km (225 103 mi) away from Earth. It is 240 km closer than the mean perigee distance, but it is still 8 088 km further than the closest perigee of 21st century.

Moon after ascending node

1 day after ascending node on 26 April 2013 at 14:07 in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 12 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 9 May 2013 at 19:12 in ♉ Taurus.

Moon before southern standstill

12 days since the last northern standstill on 15 April 2013 at 05:29 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠20.189° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next day to face maximum declination of ∠-20.170° at the point of next southern standstill on 28 April 2013 at 19:05 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

1 day since the beginning of this draconic month in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 12 days

In 12 days on 10 May 2013 at 00:29 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is going to be in a New Moon geocentric conjunction with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Moon-Earth 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