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

Waning Gibbous in Scorpio

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 99% 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 ♏ Scorpio

Moon is passing first ∠1° of ♏ Scorpio tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 1 day on 5 April 2004 at 11:03.

Pink Moon before 1 day

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2004 after 28 days on 4 May 2004 at 20:33.

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 ∠1941"

Lunar disc appears visually 1.3% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1941" and ∠1917".

Lunation 52 / 1005

The Moon is 16 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 52 of Meeus index or 1005 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.61 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 14 hours and 40 minutes and it is 51 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 1 hour and 56 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 7 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠93.6°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠93.6° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠129.7°.

Moon before perigee

10 days since point of apogee on 27 March 2004 at 07:02 in ♊ Gemini the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next day until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 8 April 2004 at 02:28 in ♏ Scorpio.

Distance to Moon 369 258 km

The Moon is 369 258 km (229 446 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next day until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 364 548 km (226 520 mi).

Moon before descending node

13 days after ascending node on 24 March 2004 at 04:55 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following day until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 7 April 2004 at 05:05 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon before southern standstill

8 days since the last northern standstill on 28 March 2004 at 19:53 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠27.541° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 4 days to face maximum declination of ∠-27.596° at the point of next southern standstill on 11 April 2004 at 00:50 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

13 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♉ Taurus the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 13 days

In 13 days on 19 April 2004 at 13:21 in ♈ Aries 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