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

Full Moon in Gemini

Full Moon on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 100%. The lunar cycle is 15 days old.

* The exact date and time of this Full Moon phase is on 20 November 2002 at 01:34 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at sunset and sets at sunrise. It is visible all night and it is high in the sky around 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 is entering ♊ Gemini

Moon is passing first ∠3° of ♊ Gemini tropical zodiac sector.

It is Beaver Moon

The Full Moon these days is the Beaver of November 2002.

Spring tide

There is high Full Moon ocean tide on this date. Combined Sun and Moon gravitational tidal force working on Earth is strong, because of the Sun-Earth-Moon syzygy alignment.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1794"

Lunar disc appears visually 7.9% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1794" and ∠1942".

Lunation 35 / 988

The Moon is 15 days old and navigating through the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 35 of Meeus index or 988 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.46 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 11 hours and 1 minute and it is 1 hour and 48 minutes shorter than the upcoming lunation's length. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to increase with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at apogee (∠180°).

Lunation length shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 1 hour and 44 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 25 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠14°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠14° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠32.1°.

Moon after apogee

4 days since point of apogee on 16 November 2002 at 11:30 in ♈ Aries the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 11 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 2 December 2002 at 08:53 in ♏ Scorpio.

Distance to Moon 399 569 km

The Moon is 399 569 km (248 281 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 11 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 362 294 km (225 119 mi).

Moon in ascending node

Moon is in ascending node in ♊ Gemini at 23:26 crossing the ecliptic from South to North. Lunar position remains north of if for the upcoming 13 days until Moon's next descending node later on 4 December 2002 at 02:12 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Moon before northern standstill

11 days since the last southern standstill on 8 November 2002 at 20:35 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-25.781° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 3 days to face maximum declination of ∠25.812° at the point of next northern standstill on 23 November 2002 at 12:14 in ♋ Cancer.

New draconic month

At 23:26 in the point ot ascending node the Moon is completing the last draconic month and is entering a new one while the lunar orbit is crossing the ecliptic from South to North.

Sun-Earth-Moon syzygy

The Moon is in a Full Moon geocentric opposition with the Sun and thus forming Sun-Earth-Moon 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