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

Waning Crescent in Capricorn

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 19% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 25 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 ♑ Capricorn

Moon is passing about ∠11° of ♑ Capricorn tropical zodiac sector.

3 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 3 days on 16 February 2009 at 21:37.

Worm Moon after 18 days

Next Full Moon is the Worm Moon of March 2009 after 18 days on 11 March 2009 at 02:38.

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 9.3% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1940".

Lunation 112 / 1065

The Moon is 25 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 112 of Meeus index or 1065 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.74 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 17 hours and 40 minutes and it is 3 hours and 9 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 4 hours and 56 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 7 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠213.2°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠213.2° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠246.2°.

Moon after apogee

1 day since point of apogee on 19 February 2009 at 17:00 in ♐ Sagittarius the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 15 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 7 March 2009 at 15:06 in ♋ Cancer.

Distance to Moon 405 377 km

The Moon is 405 377 km (251 890 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 15 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 367 020 km (228 056 mi).

Moon before ascending node

11 days after descending node on 8 February 2009 at 19:46 in ♌ Leo the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 2 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 22 February 2009 at 20:31 in ♒ Aquarius.

Moon after southern standstill

1 day since the last southern standstill on 18 February 2009 at 21:09 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-27.057° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 12 days to face maximum declination of ∠26.987° at the point of next northern standstill on 4 March 2009 at 21:34 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

24 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♒ Aquarius the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 4 days

In 4 days on 25 February 2009 at 01:35 in ♓ Pisces 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