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

Waning Crescent in Cancer

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 29% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 24 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises after midnight to early morning and sets in the afternoon. It is visible in the early morning low to the east.

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 ∠10° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

2 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 2 days on 5 September 2015 at 09:54.

Harvest Moon after 20 days

Next Full Moon is the Harvest Moon of September 2015 after 20 days on 28 September 2015 at 02:50.

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 ∠1854"

Lunar disc appears visually 2.7% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1854" and ∠1904".

Lunation 193 / 1146

The Moon is 24 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 193 of Meeus index or 1146 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.66 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 48 minutes and it is 1 hour and 36 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 3 hours and 4 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 3 hours and 59 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠144.1°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠144.1° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠169.3°.

Moon before apogee

7 days since point of perigee on 30 August 2015 at 15:24 in ♓ Pisces the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 6 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 14 September 2015 at 11:28 in ♎ Libra.

Distance to Moon 386 584 km

The Moon is 386 584 km (240 212 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 6 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 466 km (252 566 mi).

Moon before ascending node

7 days after descending node on 31 August 2015 at 10:16 in ♈ Aries 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 14 September 2015 at 04:38 in ♎ Libra.

Moon after northern standstill

1 day since the last northern standstill on 6 September 2015 at 17:06 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.163° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 14 days to face maximum declination of ∠-18.134° at the point of next southern standstill on 21 September 2015 at 12:02 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 5 days

In 5 days on 13 September 2015 at 06:41 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is going to be in a New Moon geocentric conjunction with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Moon-Earth 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