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

Waxing Gibbous in Virgo

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 86% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 11 days young.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the afternoon and sets after midnight to early morning. It is visible to the southeast in early evening and it is up for most of the night.

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.

3 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 3 days on 3 April 2017 at 18:39.

Pink Moon after 3 days

Next Full Moon is the Pink Moon of April 2017 after 3 days on 11 April 2017 at 06:08.

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 ∠1873"

Lunar disc appears visually 2.3% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1873" and ∠1916".

Lunation 213 / 1166

The Moon is 11 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 213 of Meeus index or 1166 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.39 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 9 hours and 19 minutes and it is 1 hour and 51 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 shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 3 hours and 25 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 44 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠321.4°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠321.4° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠340.4°.

Moon before apogee

7 days since point of perigee on 30 March 2017 at 12:39 in ♉ Taurus the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 7 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 15 April 2017 at 10:05 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 382 695 km

The Moon is 382 695 km (237 796 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 7 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 405 478 km (251 952 mi).

Moon in ascending node

Moon is in ascending node in ♍ Virgo at 09:14 crossing the ecliptic from South to North. Lunar position remains north of if for the upcoming 14 days until Moon's next descending node later on 21 April 2017 at 22:30 in ♒ Aquarius.

Moon after northern standstill

4 days since the last northern standstill on 3 April 2017 at 06:12 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.984° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 10 days to face maximum declination of ∠-19.095° at the point of next southern standstill on 17 April 2017 at 13:12 in ♑ Capricorn.

New draconic month

At 09:14 in the point ot ascending node the Moon is completing the last draconic month and is entering a new one while the lunar orbit is crossing the ecliptic from South to North.

Syzygy in 3 days

In 3 days on 11 April 2017 at 06:08 in ♎ Libra 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