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

Waxing Crescent in Sagittarius

Waxing Crescent on . Illuminated surface of the Moon is 34% and growing larger. Lunar cycle is 6 days young.

Moonrise and moonset

Moon rises in the morning and sets in the evening. It is visible toward the southwest in early evening.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon in ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is leaving the last ∠2° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♑ Capricorn later.

5 days after New Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 5 days on 5 October 2013 at 00:35.

Hunter Moon after 8 days

Next Full Moon is the Hunter Moon of October 2013 after 8 days on 18 October 2013 at 23:38.

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 ∠1969"

Lunar disc appears visually 2.4% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1969" and ∠1922".

Lunation 170 / 1123

The Moon is 6 days young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 170 of Meeus index or 1123 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.51 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 12 hours and 15 minutes and it is 43 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 29 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 40 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠285.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠285.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠315°.

Moon at perigee

Moon is at perigee at 23:06 about 13 days since last apogee on 27 September 2013 at 18:17 in ♋ Cancer the lunar orbit is going to widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth over the upcoming 15 days until point of next apogee on 25 October 2013 at 14:25 in ♋ Cancer.

Distance to Moon 369 813 km

This perigee Moon is 369 813 km (229 791 mi) away from Earth. It is 7 305 km closer than the mean perigee distance, but it is still 543 km further than the closest perigee of 21st century.

Moon after ascending node

3 days after ascending node on 6 October 2013 at 22:08 in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 9 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 19 October 2013 at 21:47 in ♉ Taurus.

Moon after southern standstill

1 day since the last southern standstill on 9 October 2013 at 23:52 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-19.537° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 12 days to face maximum declination of ∠19.509° at the point of next northern standstill on 23 October 2013 at 09:13 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 8 days

In 8 days on 18 October 2013 at 23:38 in ♈ Aries 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