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

Waning Gibbous in Leo

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 88% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 18 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 in ♌ Leo

Moon is passing about ∠14° of ♌ Leo tropical zodiac sector.

3 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 3 days on 21 December 2010 at 08:13.

Cold Moon before 3 days

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2011 after 26 days on 19 January 2011 at 21:21.

Neap tide

There is low ocean tide on this date. Sun and Moon gravitational forces are not aligned, but meet at big angle, so their combined tidal force is weak.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1953"

Lunar disc appears visually 0.1% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1953" and ∠1951".

Lunation 135 / 1088

The Moon is 18 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 135 of Meeus index or 1088 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.64 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 27 minutes and it is 2 hours and 1 minute 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 2 hours and 43 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 20 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠67°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠67° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠103.5°.

Moon before perigee

11 days since point of apogee on 13 December 2010 at 08:34 in ♓ Pisces 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 25 December 2010 at 12:24 in ♌ Leo.

Distance to Moon 367 079 km

The Moon is 367 079 km (228 092 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next day until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 368 463 km (228 952 mi).

Moon after descending node

2 days after descending node on 21 December 2010 at 14:08 in ♊ Gemini the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 10 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 3 January 2011 at 12:48 in ♑ Capricorn.

Moon after northern standstill

3 days since the last northern standstill on 20 December 2010 at 12:37 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠24.238° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 8 days to face maximum declination of ∠-24.242° at the point of next southern standstill on 2 January 2011 at 10:06 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 10 days

In 10 days on 4 January 2011 at 09:03 in ♑ Capricorn 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