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

Waning Gibbous in Leo

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 90% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 18 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The 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.

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 ♌ Leo

Moon is passing about ∠6° of ♌ Leo tropical zodiac sector.

2 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 2 days on 17 December 2051 at 16:05.

Cold Moon before 2 days

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2052 after 26 days on 16 January 2052 at 04:24.

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 ∠1875"

Lunar disc appears visually 4% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1875" and ∠1950".

Lunation 642 / 1595

The Moon is 18 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 642 of Meeus index or 1595 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.73 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 17 hours and 29 minutes and it is 2 hours and 4 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 4 hours and 45 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 18 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠214.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠214.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠248.4°.

Moon after perigee

4 days since point of perigee on 15 December 2051 at 19:57 in ♉ Taurus the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 7 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 27 December 2051 at 16:05 in ♎ Libra.

Distance to Moon 382 326 km

The Moon is 382 326 km (237 566 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 7 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 405 014 km (251 664 mi).

Moon before ascending node

7 days after descending node on 13 December 2051 at 08:09 in ♈ Aries 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 26 December 2051 at 10:39 in ♎ Libra.

Moon after northern standstill

2 days since the last northern standstill on 17 December 2051 at 14:21 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.789° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 11 days to face maximum declination of ∠-18.780° at the point of next southern standstill on 31 December 2051 at 19:43 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 12 days

In 12 days on 2 January 2052 at 03:05 in ♑ Capricorn 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