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

Full Moon in Cancer

Full Moon on . Illuminated surface of the Moon is 100%. Lunar cycle is 14 days old.

* The exact date and time of this Full Moon phase is on 16 January 2014 at 04:52 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

Moon rises at sunset and sets at sunrise. It is visible all night and it is high in the sky around midnight.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon in ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠18° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

It is Wolf Moon

The Full Moon these days is the Wolf of January 2014.

Spring tide

There is high Full Moon ocean tide on this date. Combined Sun and Moon gravitational tidal force working on Earth is strong, because of the Sun-Earth-Moon syzygy alignment.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1768"

Lunar disc appears visually 9.8% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1951".

Lunation 173 / 1126

The Moon is 14 days old and navigating through the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 173 of Meeus index or 1126 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.43 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 10 hours and 24 minutes and it is 3 minutes longer 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 shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 2 hours and 20 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 3 hours and 49 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠353°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠353° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠8.3°.

Moon before apogee

13 days since point of perigee on 1 January 2014 at 21:00 in ♑ Capricorn the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next day until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 16 January 2014 at 01:53 in ♋ Cancer.

Distance to Moon 405 337 km

The Moon is 405 337 km (251 865 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next day until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 537 km (252 610 mi).

Moon after descending node

6 days after descending node on 9 January 2014 at 11:26 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 8 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 24 January 2014 at 02:55 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon after northern standstill

2 days since the last northern standstill on 13 January 2014 at 08:14 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠19.501° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 12 days to face maximum declination of ∠-19.396° at the point of next southern standstill on 27 January 2014 at 16:31 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

18 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Sun-Earth-Moon syzygy

The Moon is in a Full Moon geocentric opposition with the Sun and thus forming 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