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

Waning Crescent in Virgo

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 3% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 27 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises after midnight to early morning and sets in the afternoon. It is visible in the early morning low to the east.

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 in ♍ Virgo

Moon is leaving the last ∠1° of ♍ Virgo tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♎ Libra later.

6 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 6 days on 6 October 2004 at 10:12.

Hunter Moon after 15 days

Next Full Moon is the Hunter Moon of October 2004 after 15 days on 28 October 2004 at 03:07.

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 ∠1856"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.6% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1856" and ∠1923".

Lunation 58 / 1011

The Moon is 27 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 58 of Meeus index or 1011 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.51 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 12 hours and 19 minutes and it is 40 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 shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 25 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 44 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠269.4°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠269.4° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠302.8°.

Moon before perigee

6 days since point of apogee on 5 October 2004 at 22:10 in ♋ Cancer the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 5 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 18 October 2004 at 00:03 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 386 253 km

The Moon is 386 253 km (240 006 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 5 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 367 758 km (228 514 mi).

Moon before descending node

11 days after ascending node on 30 September 2004 at 13:30 in ♈ Aries the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 2 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 14 October 2004 at 21:47 in ♎ Libra.

Moon after northern standstill

6 days since the last northern standstill on 5 October 2004 at 17:37 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠28.020° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 6 days to face maximum declination of ∠-28.048° at the point of next southern standstill on 19 October 2004 at 08:00 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

11 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♈ Aries the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 1 day

In 1 day on 14 October 2004 at 02:48 in ♎ Libra 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