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

Waning Crescent in Libra

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 6% 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 is entering ♎ Libra

Moon is passing first ∠2° of ♎ Libra tropical zodiac sector.

5 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 5 days on 18 October 2068 at 00:00.

Beaver Moon after 16 days

Next Full Moon is the Beaver Moon of November 2068 after 16 days on 9 November 2068 at 11:40.

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 ∠1768"

Lunar disc appears visually 8.7% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1929".

Lunation 850 / 1803

The Moon is 27 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 850 of Meeus index or 1803 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 4 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. This is the year's longest synodic month of 2068. 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 ∠183.9°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠183.9° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠209.1°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 04:48 about 12 days since last perigee on 10 October 2068 at 11:20 in ♈ Aries the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 15 days until point of next perigee on 7 November 2068 at 20:44 in ♈ Aries.

Distance to Moon 406 142 km

This apogee Moon is 406 142 km (252 365 mi) away from Earth. It is 734 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 567 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon before ascending node

10 days after descending node on 13 October 2068 at 09:31 in ♉ Taurus 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 27 October 2068 at 18:44 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon before southern standstill

8 days since the last northern standstill on 15 October 2068 at 05:07 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠20.707° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 6 days to face maximum declination of ∠-20.659° at the point of next southern standstill on 29 October 2068 at 20:53 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 2 days

In 2 days on 26 October 2068 at 04:17 in ♏ Scorpio 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