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

Waning Crescent in Taurus

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 is entering ♉ Taurus

Moon is passing first ∠3° of ♉ Taurus tropical zodiac sector.

6 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 6 days on 6 May 2010 at 04:15.

Flower Moon after 15 days

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2010 after 15 days on 27 May 2010 at 23:07.

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 ∠1831"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.6% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1831" and ∠1899".

Lunation 127 / 1080

The Moon is 27 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 127 of Meeus index or 1080 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.52 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 12 hours and 35 minutes and it is 2 hours and 25 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 9 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 6 hours longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠247.4°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠247.4° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠282.4°.

Moon after apogee

5 days since point of apogee on 6 May 2010 at 21:53 in ♒ Aquarius the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 7 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 20 May 2010 at 08:38 in ♌ Leo.

Distance to Moon 391 408 km

The Moon is 391 408 km (243 210 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 7 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 369 729 km (229 739 mi).

Moon before descending node

8 days after ascending node on 3 May 2010 at 12:35 in ♑ Capricorn the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 5 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 17 May 2010 at 15:39 in ♋ Cancer.

Moon before northern standstill

10 days since the last southern standstill on 1 May 2010 at 14:01 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-25.109° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 3 days to face maximum declination of ∠25.049° at the point of next northern standstill on 15 May 2010 at 23:07 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

8 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♑ Capricorn the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 1 day

In 1 day on 14 May 2010 at 01:04 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