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

Last Quarter in Capricorn

Last Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 54% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 21 days old.

* The exact date and time of this Last Quarter phase is on 29 March 2008 at 21:47 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at midnight and sets at noon. It is visible to the south in the morning.

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 ♑ Capricorn

Moon is passing about ∠5° of ♑ Capricorn tropical zodiac sector.

Pink Moon after 21 days

Next Full Moon is the Pink Moon of April 2008 after 21 days on 20 April 2008 at 10:25.

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 ∠1786"

Lunar disc appears visually 7.3% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1786" and ∠1921".

Lunation 101 / 1054

The Moon is 21 days old and navigating through the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 101 of Meeus index or 1054 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.45 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 10 hours and 41 minutes and it is 2 hours and 18 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 2 hours and 3 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 6 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠310.8°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠310.8° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠332.7°.

Moon after apogee

2 days since point of apogee on 26 March 2008 at 20:13 in ♏ Scorpio the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 9 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 7 April 2008 at 19:28 in ♉ Taurus.

Distance to Moon 401 235 km

The Moon is 401 235 km (249 316 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 9 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 361 083 km (224 367 mi).

Moon before ascending node

10 days after descending node on 19 March 2008 at 02:53 in ♌ Leo the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 4 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 2 April 2008 at 15:18 in ♒ Aquarius.

Moon after southern standstill

1 day since the last southern standstill on 28 March 2008 at 16:00 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-27.898° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 12 days to face maximum declination of ∠27.812° at the point of next northern standstill on 10 April 2008 at 17:42 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 7 days

In 7 days on 6 April 2008 at 03:55 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