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

Waxing Crescent in Taurus

Waxing Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 4% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 2 days young.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the morning and sets in the evening. It is visible toward the southwest in early evening.

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 ∠23° of ♉ Taurus tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after New Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 1 day on 19 April 2004 at 13:21.

Flower Moon after 13 days

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2004 after 13 days on 4 May 2004 at 20:33.

Moderate tide

There is medium ocean tide on this date. Sun and Moon gravitational forces are not aligned, but meet at very acute angle, so their combined tidal force is moderate.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1778"

Lunar disc appears visually 7.1% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1778" and ∠1909".

Lunation 53 / 1006

The Moon is 2 days young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 53 of Meeus index or 1006 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.65 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 31 minutes and it is 4 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 2 hours and 47 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 16 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠129.7°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠129.7° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠158.3°.

Moon before apogee

13 days since point of perigee on 8 April 2004 at 02:28 in ♏ Scorpio the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 2 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 24 April 2004 at 00:26 in ♊ Gemini.

Distance to Moon 403 212 km

The Moon is 403 212 km (250 544 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 2 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 405 403 km (251 906 mi).

Moon after ascending node

1 day after ascending node on 20 April 2004 at 11:40 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 13 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 4 May 2004 at 15:00 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon before northern standstill

10 days since the last southern standstill on 11 April 2004 at 00:50 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-27.596° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 3 days to face maximum declination of ∠27.628° at the point of next northern standstill on 25 April 2004 at 03:32 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

1 day since the beginning of this draconic month in ♉ Taurus the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 13 days

In 13 days on 4 May 2004 at 20:33 in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is going to be in a Full Moon geocentric opposition with the Sun and thus forming the next 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