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

Waxing Crescent in Virgo

Waxing Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 10% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 3 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 ♍ Virgo

Moon is passing about ∠17° of ♍ Virgo tropical zodiac sector.

2 days after New Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 2 days on 30 July 2011 at 18:40.

Sturgeon Moon after 11 days

Next Full Moon is the Sturgeon Moon of August 2011 after 11 days on 13 August 2011 at 18:58.

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 ∠1961"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.6% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1961" and ∠1891".

Lunation 143 / 1096

The Moon is 3 days young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 143 of Meeus index or 1096 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.35 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 8 hours and 24 minutes and it is 19 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 4 hours and 20 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 49 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠312.1°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠312.1° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠333.4°.

Moon at perigee

Moon is at perigee at 20:59 about 11 days since last apogee on 21 July 2011 at 22:46 in ♈ Aries the lunar orbit is going to widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth over the upcoming 16 days until point of next apogee on 18 August 2011 at 16:23 in ♈ Aries.

Distance to Moon 365 756 km

This perigee Moon is 365 756 km (227 270 mi) away from Earth. It is 3 248 km closer than the mean perigee distance, but it is still 4 600 km further than the closest perigee of 21st century.

Moon after descending node

5 days after descending node on 27 July 2011 at 12:03 in ♊ Gemini the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 6 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 9 August 2011 at 06:35 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Moon after northern standstill

6 days since the last northern standstill on 27 July 2011 at 03:02 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠23.333° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 6 days to face maximum declination of ∠-23.270° at the point of next southern standstill on 8 August 2011 at 23:15 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 11 days

In 11 days on 13 August 2011 at 18:58 in ♒ Aquarius 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