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

Last Quarter in Scorpio

Last Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 53% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 21 days old.

* The exact date and time of this Last Quarter phase is on 18 February 2017 at 19:33 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at midnight and sets at noon. It is visible to the south in the morning.

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 ♏ Scorpio

Moon is leaving the last ∠3° of ♏ Scorpio tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♐ Sagittarius later.

Worm Moon after 22 days

Next Full Moon is the Worm Moon of March 2017 after 22 days on 12 March 2017 at 14:54.

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 ∠1768"

Lunar disc appears visually 9.3% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1941".

Lunation 211 / 1164

The Moon is 21 days old and navigating through the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 211 of Meeus index or 1164 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.62 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 14 hours and 51 minutes and it is 2 hours and 52 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 2 hours and 7 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 56 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠259.5°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠259.5° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠295°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 21:14 about 12 days since last perigee on 6 February 2017 at 13:59 in ♊ Gemini the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 12 days until point of next perigee on 3 March 2017 at 07:24 in ♉ Taurus.

Distance to Moon 404 376 km

This apogee Moon is 404 376 km (251 268 mi) away from Earth. It is 1 032 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 2 333 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon after ascending node

6 days after ascending node on 11 February 2017 at 19:49 in ♌ Leo the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 7 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 26 February 2017 at 06:28 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon before southern standstill

10 days since the last northern standstill on 7 February 2017 at 18:34 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.865° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 3 days to face maximum declination of ∠-18.848° at the point of next southern standstill on 21 February 2017 at 20:50 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

6 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♌ Leo the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 8 days

In 8 days on 26 February 2017 at 14:58 in ♓ Pisces 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