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 35% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 23 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 ♎ Libra

Moon is leaving the last ∠2° of ♎ Libra tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♏ Scorpio later.

1 day after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 1 day on 29 December 2094 at 20:27.

Wolf Moon after 20 days

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2095 after 20 days on 20 January 2095 at 12:48.

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 ∠1791"

Lunar disc appears visually 8.6% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1791" and ∠1951".

Lunation 1174 / 2127

The Moon is 23 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 1174 of Meeus index or 2127 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.57 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 13 hours and 43 minutes and it is 1 hour and 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 59 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 6 hours and 4 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠287.7°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠287.7° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠317.1°.

Moon after apogee

3 days since point of apogee on 28 December 2094 at 08:42 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 8 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 9 January 2095 at 02:21 in ♒ Aquarius.

Distance to Moon 400 135 km

The Moon is 400 135 km (248 632 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 8 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 364 985 km (226 791 mi).

Moon before descending node

9 days after ascending node on 21 December 2094 at 16:09 in ♊ Gemini the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 4 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 5 January 2095 at 02:54 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Moon before southern standstill

8 days since the last northern standstill on 22 December 2094 at 16:45 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠24.122° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 5 days to face maximum declination of ∠-24.121° at the point of next southern standstill on 6 January 2095 at 01:32 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 5 days

In 5 days on 6 January 2095 at 09:33 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