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 6% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 2 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 is entering ♍ Virgo

Moon is passing first ∠4° of ♍ Virgo tropical zodiac sector.

2 days after New Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 2 days on 26 July 2014 at 22:42.

Sturgeon Moon after 12 days

Next Full Moon is the Sturgeon Moon of August 2014 after 12 days on 10 August 2014 at 18:09.

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 ∠1772"

Lunar disc appears visually 6.4% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1772" and ∠1890".

Lunation 180 / 1133

The Moon is 2 days young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 180 of Meeus index or 1133 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.65 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 31 minutes and it is 30 minutes shorter 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 2 hours and 47 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 16 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠169.2°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠169.2° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠192.1°.

Moon after apogee

1 day since point of apogee on 28 July 2014 at 03:27 in ♌ Leo the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 12 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 10 August 2014 at 17:43 in ♒ Aquarius.

Distance to Moon 404 449 km

The Moon is 404 449 km (251 313 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 12 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 356 897 km (221 766 mi).

Moon before ascending node

10 days after descending node on 18 July 2014 at 21:21 in ♈ Aries the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 3 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 2 August 2014 at 11:26 in ♎ Libra.

Moon after northern standstill

5 days since the last northern standstill on 23 July 2014 at 15:36 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.934° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 8 days to face maximum declination of ∠-18.827° at the point of next southern standstill on 7 August 2014 at 04:26 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

23 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♎ Libra the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 12 days

In 12 days on 10 August 2014 at 18:09 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