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

Waxing Gibbous in Gemini

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 88% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 11 days young.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the afternoon and sets after midnight to early morning. It is visible to the southeast in early evening and it is up for most of the night.

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 ♊ Gemini

Moon is passing about ∠23° of ♊ Gemini tropical zodiac sector.

4 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 4 days on 18 January 2013 at 23:45.

Wolf Moon after 3 days

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2013 after 3 days on 27 January 2013 at 04:38.

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 ∠1769"

Lunar disc appears visually 9.7% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1769" and ∠1949".

Lunation 161 / 1114

The Moon is 11 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 161 of Meeus index or 1114 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.48 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 11 hours and 36 minutes and it is 55 minutes 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 shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 1 hour and 8 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 1 minute longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠23.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠23.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠44.2°.

Moon after apogee

1 day since point of apogee on 22 January 2013 at 10:52 in ♊ Gemini the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 15 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 7 February 2013 at 12:09 in ♑ Capricorn.

Distance to Moon 405 268 km

The Moon is 405 268 km (251 822 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 15 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 365 314 km (226 996 mi).

Moon after descending node

2 days after descending node on 21 January 2013 at 01:19 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 11 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 4 February 2013 at 02:14 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon at northern standstill

At 05:12 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach North declination of ∠20.816°. This is the year's northernmost lunar standstill of 2013. Over the upcoming 13 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt southward to face maximum declination of ∠-20.704° at the point of next southern standstill in ♐ Sagittarius on 6 February 2013 at 00:27.

Draconic month

15 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 3 days

In 3 days on 27 January 2013 at 04:38 in ♌ Leo the Moon is going to be in a Full Moon geocentric opposition with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Earth-Moon 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