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

Last Quarter in Cancer

Last Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 49% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 22 days old.

* The exact date and time of this Last Quarter phase is on 23 September 2016 at 09:56 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at midnight and sets at noon. It is visible to the south in the morning.

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 ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing first ∠2° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

Hunter Moon after 22 days

Next Full Moon is the Hunter Moon of October 2016 after 22 days on 16 October 2016 at 04:23.

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 ∠1939"

Lunar disc appears visually 1.4% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1939" and ∠1913".

Lunation 206 / 1159

The Moon is 22 days old and navigating through the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 206 of Meeus index or 1159 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.63 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 8 minutes and it is 2 hours and 19 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 2 hours and 24 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 39 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠112.8°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠112.8° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠144.6°.

Moon after perigee

4 days since point of perigee on 18 September 2016 at 17:00 in ♈ Aries 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 4 October 2016 at 11:02 in ♏ Scorpio.

Distance to Moon 369 650 km

The Moon is 369 650 km (229 690 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 10 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 100 km (252 339 mi).

Moon before ascending node

7 days after descending node on 15 September 2016 at 23:55 in ♓ Pisces 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 28 September 2016 at 22:06 in ♍ Virgo.

Moon at northern standstill

At 16:44 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach North declination of ∠18.475°. Over the upcoming 14 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt southward to face maximum declination of ∠-18.546° at the point of next southern standstill in ♑ Capricorn on 8 October 2016 at 06:03.

Draconic month

21 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♍ Virgo the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 7 days

In 7 days on 1 October 2016 at 00:12 in ♎ Libra 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