Waning
Gibbous ♉ Taurus
Moon phase on 15 September 2011 Thursday is Waning Gibbous, 17 days old Moon is in Aries.
Share this page: twitter facebook linkedinWaning Gibbous is the lunar phase on . Seen from Earth, illuminated fraction of the Moon surface is 91% and getting smaller. The 17 days old Moon is in ♈ Aries.
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Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 3 days on 12 September 2011 at 09:27.
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.
Moon is leaving the last ∠4° of ♈ Aries tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♉ Taurus later.
Lunar disc appears visually 7.6% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1908".
Next Full Moon is the Hunter Moon of October 2011 after 26 days on 12 October 2011 at 02:06.
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.
The Moon is 17 days old. Earth's natural satellite is moving from the middle to the last part of current synodic month. This is lunation 144 of Meeus index or 1097 from Brown series.
Length of current 144 lunation is 29 days, 8 hours and 5 minutes. This is the year's shortest synodic month of 2011. It is 42 minutes shorter than next lunation 145 length.
Length of current synodic month is 4 hours and 39 minutes shorter than the mean length of synodic month, but it is still 1 hour and 30 minutes longer, compared to 21st century shortest.
This lunation true anomaly is ∠333.4°. At the beginning of next synodic month true anomaly will be ∠350.1°. The length of upcoming synodic months will keep decreasing since the true anomaly gets closer to the value of New Moon at point of perigee (∠0° or ∠360°).
Moon is reaching point of apogee on this date at 06:23, this is 15 days after last perigee on 30 August 2011 at 17:35 in ♍ Virgo. Lunar orbit is starting to get closer, while the Moon is moving inward the Earth for 12 days ahead, until it will get to the point of next perigee on 28 September 2011 at 01:01 in ♎ Libra.
This apogee Moon is 406 068 km (252 319 mi) away from Earth. It is 660 km farther than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 641 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.
10 days after its ascending node on 5 September 2011 at 07:36 in ♐ Sagittarius, the Moon is following the northern part of its orbit for the next 4 days, until it will cross the ecliptic from North to South in descending node on 19 September 2011 at 19:38 in ♊ Gemini.
10 days after beginning of current draconic month in ♐ Sagittarius, the Moon is moving from the beginning to the first part of it.
10 days after previous South standstill on 5 September 2011 at 05:01 in ♐ Sagittarius, when Moon has reached southern declination of ∠-23.047°. Next 4 days the lunar orbit moves northward to face North declination of ∠22.890° in the next northern standstill on 19 September 2011 at 20:05 in ♊ Gemini.
After 11 days on 27 September 2011 at 11:09 in ♎ Libra, the Moon will be in New Moon geocentric conjunction with the Sun and this alignment forms next Sun-Moon-Earth syzygy.