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

Waxing Gibbous in Taurus

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 71% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 9 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 in ♉ Taurus

Moon is passing about ∠17° of ♉ Taurus tropical zodiac sector.

2 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 2 days on 9 January 2041 at 10:06.

Wolf Moon after 5 days

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2041 after 5 days on 17 January 2041 at 07:11.

Moderate tide

There is medium ocean tide on this date. Sun and Moon gravitational forces are not aligned, but meet at very acute angle, so their combined tidal force is moderate.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1863"

Lunar disc appears visually 4.6% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1863" and ∠1951".

Lunation 507 / 1460

The Moon is 9 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 507 of Meeus index or 1460 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.44 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 10 hours and 35 minutes and it is 39 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 2 hours and 9 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠342.7°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠342.7° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠358.5°.

Moon before apogee

7 days since point of perigee on 3 January 2041 at 19:39 in ♑ Capricorn 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 18 January 2041 at 23:16 in ♌ Leo.

Distance to Moon 384 761 km

The Moon is 384 761 km (239 079 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 7 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 419 km (252 537 mi).

Moon before ascending node

12 days after descending node on 30 December 2040 at 10:13 in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following day until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 12 January 2041 at 00:01 in ♉ Taurus.

Moon before northern standstill

9 days since the last southern standstill on 2 January 2041 at 11:44 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-26.763° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 4 days to face maximum declination of ∠26.766° at the point of next northern standstill on 15 January 2041 at 15:57 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

26 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♉ Taurus the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 5 days

In 5 days on 17 January 2041 at 07:11 in ♋ Cancer 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