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

Waning Crescent in Aquarius

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 5% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 27 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises after midnight to early morning and sets in the afternoon. It is visible in the early morning low to the east.

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 ♒ Aquarius

Moon is passing about ∠5° of ♒ Aquarius tropical zodiac sector.

5 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 5 days on 13 February 2042 at 07:16.

Worm Moon after 16 days

Next Full Moon is the Worm Moon of March 2042 after 16 days on 6 March 2042 at 20:10.

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 ∠1932"

Lunar disc appears visually 0.4% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1932" and ∠1941".

Lunation 520 / 1473

The Moon is 27 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 520 of Meeus index or 1473 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.46 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 10 hours and 57 minutes and it is 1 hour and 13 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 47 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 22 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠326°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠326° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠344.2°.

Moon before perigee

9 days since point of apogee on 8 February 2042 at 21:14 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 2 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 21 February 2042 at 05:54 in ♓ Pisces.

Distance to Moon 370 925 km

The Moon is 370 925 km (230 482 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 2 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 358 434 km (222 721 mi).

Moon before ascending node

7 days after descending node on 11 February 2042 at 04:28 in ♎ Libra 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 February 2042 at 02:02 in ♈ Aries.

Moon after southern standstill

2 days since the last southern standstill on 16 February 2042 at 09:22 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-27.949° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 10 days to face maximum declination of ∠28.031° at the point of next northern standstill on 28 February 2042 at 23:35 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 1 day

In 1 day on 20 February 2042 at 07:39 in ♓ Pisces 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