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

Waxing Crescent in Aries

Waxing Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 2% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 1 day 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 is entering ♈ Aries

Moon is passing first ∠3° of ♈ Aries tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after New Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 1 day on 4 March 2011 at 20:46.

Worm Moon after 13 days

Next Full Moon is the Worm Moon of March 2011 after 13 days on 19 March 2011 at 18:10.

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 ∠1768"

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

Lunation 138 / 1091

The Moon is 1 day young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 138 of Meeus index or 1091 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.74 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 17 hours and 46 minutes and it is 1 hour and 28 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 5 hours and 2 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 1 minute shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠167°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠167° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠190.9°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 07:50 about 15 days since last perigee on 19 February 2011 at 07:27 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 13 days until point of next perigee on 19 March 2011 at 19:09 in ♍ Virgo.

Distance to Moon 406 584 km

This apogee Moon is 406 584 km (252 640 mi) away from Earth. It is 1 176 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 125 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon before descending node

7 days after ascending node on 26 February 2011 at 20:19 in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 6 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 13 March 2011 at 11:55 in ♊ Gemini.

Moon before northern standstill

8 days since the last southern standstill on 25 February 2011 at 22:13 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-23.985° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 6 days to face maximum declination of ∠23.825° at the point of next northern standstill on 12 March 2011 at 17:06 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

7 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 13 days

In 13 days on 19 March 2011 at 18:10 in ♍ Virgo 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