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

Waning Gibbous in Capricorn

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 84% 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 ♑ Capricorn

Moon is passing about ∠6° of ♑ Capricorn tropical zodiac sector.

3 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 3 days on 6 May 2012 at 03:35.

Flower Moon before 3 days

Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon of June 2012 after 25 days on 4 June 2012 at 11:12.

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 ∠1938"

Lunar disc appears visually 2% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1938" and ∠1900".

Lunation 152 / 1105

The Moon is 18 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 152 of Meeus index or 1105 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.69 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 16 hours and 29 minutes and it is 1 hour and 14 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 3 hours and 45 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 3 hours and 18 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠168.7°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠168.7° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠191.8°.

Moon after perigee

3 days since point of perigee on 6 May 2012 at 03:33 in ♏ Scorpio the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 10 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 19 May 2012 at 16:13 in ♉ Taurus.

Distance to Moon 369 904 km

The Moon is 369 904 km (229 848 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 10 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 451 km (252 557 mi).

Moon after ascending node

2 days after ascending node on 7 May 2012 at 09:43 in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 11 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 21 May 2012 at 09:21 in ♊ Gemini.

Moon after southern standstill

1 day since the last southern standstill on 8 May 2012 at 06:18 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-21.719° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 12 days to face maximum declination of ∠21.709° at the point of next northern standstill on 22 May 2012 at 11:13 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

2 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 11 days

In 11 days on 20 May 2012 at 23:47 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