Waxing Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 5% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 2 days young.
The moon rises in the morning and sets in the evening. It is visible toward the southwest in early evening.
Slide horizontally to discover the moon phase on nearby dates.
Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.
Moon is passing about ∠10° of ♎ Libra tropical zodiac sector.
Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 2 days on 3 September 2024 at 01:55.
Next Full Moon is the Harvest Moon of September 2024 after 12 days on 18 September 2024 at 02:34.
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.
Lunar disc appears visually 7.4% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1904".
The Moon is 2 days young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 305 of Meeus index or 1258 from Brown series.
The length of this lunation is 29 days, 16 hours and 54 minutes and it is 1 hour and 4 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°).
The length of the current synodic month is 4 hours and 10 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 53 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.
The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠155.7° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠179.7°.
Moon is at apogee at 14:55 about 15 days since last perigee on 21 August 2024 at 05:05 in ♓ Pisces the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 13 days until point of next perigee on 18 September 2024 at 13:26 in ♓ Pisces.
This apogee Moon is 406 215 km (252 410 mi) away from Earth. It is 807 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 494 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.
Moon is in descending node in ♎ Libra at 05:43 crossing the ecliptic from North to South. Lunar position remains south of if for the upcoming 13 days until Moon's next ascending node later on 18 September 2024 at 19:51 in ♓ Pisces.
8 days since the last northern standstill on 28 August 2024 at 11:09 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠28.606° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 6 days to face maximum declination of ∠-28.671° at the point of next southern standstill on 12 September 2024 at 04:51 in ♑ Capricorn.
14 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♈ Aries the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.
In 12 days on 18 September 2024 at 02:34 in ♓ Pisces 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.
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