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

Waxing Crescent in Cancer

Waxing Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 25% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 5 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 ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠25° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

5 days after New Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 5 days on 10 May 2013 at 00:29.

Flower Moon after 9 days

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2013 after 9 days on 25 May 2013 at 04:25.

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 ∠1778"

Lunar disc appears visually 6.5% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1778" and ∠1898".

Lunation 165 / 1118

The Moon is 5 days young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 165 of Meeus index or 1118 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.64 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 28 minutes and it is 10 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. This is the year's longest synodic month of 2013. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to increase with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at apogee (∠180°).

Lunation length longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 2 hours and 44 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 19 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠143.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠143.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠168.8°.

Moon after apogee

1 day since point of apogee on 13 May 2013 at 13:31 in ♊ Gemini the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 10 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 26 May 2013 at 01:45 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 403 041 km

The Moon is 403 041 km (250 438 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 10 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 358 375 km (222 684 mi).

Moon after descending node

5 days after descending node on 9 May 2013 at 19:12 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 8 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 24 May 2013 at 00:40 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon after northern standstill

2 days since the last northern standstill on 12 May 2013 at 12:30 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠20.170° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 10 days to face maximum declination of ∠-20.182° at the point of next southern standstill on 26 May 2013 at 04:47 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

18 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 9 days

In 9 days on 25 May 2013 at 04:25 in ♐ Sagittarius 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