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

Waning Crescent in Scorpio

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 15% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 25 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 is entering ♏ Scorpio

Moon is passing first ∠0° of ♏ Scorpio tropical zodiac sector.

4 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 4 days on 3 December 2015 at 07:40.

Cold Moon after 17 days

Next Full Moon is the Cold Moon of December 2015 after 17 days on 25 December 2015 at 11:11.

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 ∠1773"

Lunar disc appears visually 9.4% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1773" and ∠1948".

Lunation 196 / 1149

The Moon is 25 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 196 of Meeus index or 1149 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.7 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 16 hours and 42 minutes and it is 1 hour and 41 minutes longer 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 3 hours and 58 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 3 hours and 5 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠220.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠220.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠255.6°.

Moon after apogee

1 day since point of apogee on 5 December 2015 at 14:56 in ♎ Libra the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 13 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 21 December 2015 at 08:53 in ♉ Taurus.

Distance to Moon 404 185 km

The Moon is 404 185 km (251 149 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 13 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 368 418 km (228 924 mi).

Moon after ascending node

2 days after ascending node on 4 December 2015 at 18:33 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 11 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 18 December 2015 at 15:13 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon before southern standstill

9 days since the last northern standstill on 27 November 2015 at 20:13 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.384° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 4 days to face maximum declination of ∠-18.438° at the point of next southern standstill on 12 December 2015 at 08:15 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 3 days

In 3 days on 11 December 2015 at 10:29 in ♐ Sagittarius 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