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

Last Quarter in Libra

Last Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 50% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 22 days old.

* The exact date and time of this Last Quarter phase is on 11 January 2007 at 12:45 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at midnight and sets at noon. It is visible to the south in the morning.

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 passing about ∠21° of ♎ Libra tropical zodiac sector.

Snow Moon after 21 days

Next Full Moon is the Snow Moon of February 2007 after 21 days on 2 February 2007 at 05:45.

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 ∠1770"

Lunar disc appears visually 9.8% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1770" and ∠1951".

Lunation 86 / 1039

The Moon is 22 days old and navigating through the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 86 of Meeus index or 1039 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.58 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 14 hours and 1 minute and it is 1 hour and 46 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 1 hour and 16 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 47 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠276.5°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠276.5° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠308.6°.

Moon after apogee

1 day since point of apogee on 10 January 2007 at 16:26 in ♎ Libra 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 22 January 2007 at 12:24 in ♓ Pisces.

Distance to Moon 405 062 km

The Moon is 405 062 km (251 694 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 11 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 366 929 km (227 999 mi).

Moon after descending node

2 days after descending node on 8 January 2007 at 17:44 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 11 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 22 January 2007 at 13:00 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon before southern standstill

9 days since the last northern standstill on 2 January 2007 at 11:57 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠28.396° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 5 days to face maximum declination of ∠-28.448° at the point of next southern standstill on 16 January 2007 at 22:07 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

16 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♓ Pisces the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 7 days

In 7 days on 19 January 2007 at 04:01 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