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

Waning Gibbous in Cancer

Waning Gibbous on . Illuminated surface of the Moon is 75% and getting smaller. Lunar cycle is 19 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

Moon rises in the evening and sets in the morning. It is visible to the southwest and it is high in the sky after midnight.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon in ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠10° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

5 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 5 days on 28 October 2004 at 03:07.

Hunter Moon before 5 days

Next Full Moon is the Beaver Moon of November 2004 after 24 days on 26 November 2004 at 20:07.

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 9% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1934".

Lunation 59 / 1012

The Moon is 19 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 59 of Meeus index or 1012 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.49 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 11 hours and 39 minutes and it is 37 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 1 hour and 5 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 4 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠302.8°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠302.8° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠327.5°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 18:09 about 15 days since last perigee on 18 October 2004 at 00:03 in ♐ Sagittarius the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 12 days until point of next perigee on 14 November 2004 at 13:54 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 404 999 km

This apogee Moon is 404 999 km (251 655 mi) away from Earth. It is 409 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 1 710 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon after ascending node

5 days after ascending node on 27 October 2004 at 21:41 in ♈ Aries the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 8 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 11 November 2004 at 07:43 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon at northern standstill

At 01:32 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach North declination of ∠28.042°. This is the year's northernmost lunar standstill of 2004. Over the upcoming 13 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt southward to face maximum declination of ∠-28.013° at the point of next southern standstill in ♐ Sagittarius on 15 November 2004 at 14:59.

Draconic month

5 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♈ Aries the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 10 days

In 10 days on 12 November 2004 at 14:27 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