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

Waning Crescent in Taurus

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 33% 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 ♉ Taurus

Moon is passing about ∠13° of ♉ Taurus tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 1 day on 13 July 2001 at 18:45.

Sturgeon Moon after 19 days

Next Full Moon is the Sturgeon Moon of August 2001 after 19 days on 4 August 2001 at 05:56.

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 ∠1848"

Lunar disc appears visually 2.1% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1848" and ∠1888".

Lunation 18 / 971

The Moon is 23 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 18 of Meeus index or 971 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.32 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 7 hours and 47 minutes and it is 36 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 4 hours and 57 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 12 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠324.1°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠324.1° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠342.5°.

Moon after apogee

6 days since point of apogee on 9 July 2001 at 11:24 in ♒ Aquarius the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 6 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 21 July 2001 at 20:44 in ♌ Leo.

Distance to Moon 387 801 km

The Moon is 387 801 km (240 968 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 6 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 359 027 km (223 089 mi).

Moon before ascending node

10 days after descending node on 5 July 2001 at 00:48 in ♑ Capricorn the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 3 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 19 July 2001 at 08:24 in ♋ Cancer.

Moon before northern standstill

9 days since the last southern standstill on 5 July 2001 at 12:19 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-23.413° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 4 days to face maximum declination of ∠23.418° at the point of next northern standstill on 19 July 2001 at 17:53 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

23 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 5 days

In 5 days on 20 July 2001 at 19:44 in ♋ Cancer 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