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

First Quarter in Virgo

First Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 53% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 8 days young.

* The exact date and time of this First Quarter phase is on 18 May 2013 at 04:35 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at noon and sets at midnight. It is visible high in the southern sky in early evening.

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 ♍ Virgo

Moon is passing first ∠1° of ♍ Virgo tropical zodiac sector.

Flower Moon after 6 days

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2013 after 6 days on 25 May 2013 at 04:25.

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 ∠1824"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.9% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1824" and ∠1897".

Lunation 165 / 1118

The Moon is 8 days young and navigating through the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 165 of Meeus index or 1118 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.64 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 28 minutes and it is 10 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. This is the year's longest synodic month of 2013. 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 44 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 19 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠143.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠143.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠168.8°.

Moon after apogee

4 days since point of apogee on 13 May 2013 at 13:31 in ♊ Gemini 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 26 May 2013 at 01:45 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 392 947 km

The Moon is 392 947 km (244 166 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 7 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 358 375 km (222 684 mi).

Moon before ascending node

8 days after descending node on 9 May 2013 at 19:12 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 5 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 24 May 2013 at 00:40 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon after northern standstill

5 days since the last northern standstill on 12 May 2013 at 12:30 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠20.170° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 7 days to face maximum declination of ∠-20.182° at the point of next southern standstill on 26 May 2013 at 04:47 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

21 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 6 days

In 6 days on 25 May 2013 at 04:25 in ♐ Sagittarius 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