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

Waning Gibbous in Aries

Waning Gibbous on . Illuminated surface of the Moon is 90% and getting smaller. Lunar cycle is 17 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

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.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon in ♈ Aries

Moon is passing about ∠9° of ♈ Aries tropical zodiac sector.

2 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 2 days on 22 August 2021 at 12:02.

Sturgeon Moon before 2 days

Next Full Moon is the Harvest Moon of September 2021 after 26 days on 20 September 2021 at 23:55.

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 ∠1812"

Lunar disc appears visually 4.7% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1812" and ∠1899".

Lunation 267 / 1220

The Moon is 17 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 267 of Meeus index or 1220 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.46 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 11 hours and 2 minutes and it is 48 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 1 hour and 42 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 27 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠264.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠264.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠297.8°.

Moon before apogee

8 days since point of perigee on 17 August 2021 at 09:23 in ♐ Sagittarius the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 4 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 30 August 2021 at 02:22 in ♊ Gemini.

Distance to Moon 395 611 km

The Moon is 395 611 km (245 821 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 4 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 404 100 km (251 096 mi).

Moon before ascending node

8 days after descending node on 16 August 2021 at 16:04 in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 4 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 30 August 2021 at 05:13 in ♊ Gemini.

Moon after southern standstill

6 days since the last southern standstill on 18 August 2021 at 22:24 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-25.761° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 7 days to face maximum declination of ∠25.868° at the point of next northern standstill on 2 September 2021 at 00:23 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

22 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♊ Gemini the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 12 days

In 12 days on 7 September 2021 at 00:52 in ♍ Virgo 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