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 13% 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 ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠12° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

3 days after New Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 3 days on 18 May 2015 at 04:13.

Strawberry Moon after 12 days

Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon of June 2015 after 12 days on 2 June 2015 at 16:19.

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 ∠1832"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.4% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1832" and ∠1896".

Lunation 190 / 1143

The Moon is 3 days young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 190 of Meeus index or 1143 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.41 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 9 hours and 52 minutes and it is 1 hour and 27 minutes shorter than the upcoming lunation's length. 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 shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 2 hours and 52 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 3 hours and 17 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠48.8°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠48.8° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠78.1°.

Moon before apogee

6 days since point of perigee on 15 May 2015 at 00:23 in ♈ Aries the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 5 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 26 May 2015 at 22:12 in ♍ Virgo.

Distance to Moon 391 322 km

The Moon is 391 322 km (243 156 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 5 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 404 246 km (251 187 mi).

Moon after descending node

6 days after descending node on 14 May 2015 at 20:37 in ♈ Aries the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 7 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 28 May 2015 at 14:40 in ♎ Libra.

Moon after northern standstill

1 day since the last northern standstill on 20 May 2015 at 09:41 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.389° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 13 days to face maximum declination of ∠-18.440° at the point of next southern standstill on 3 June 2015 at 21:10 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

20 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 2 June 2015 at 16:19 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