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

Waning Crescent in Sagittarius

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 4% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 27 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 in ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is passing about ∠7° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector.

5 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 5 days on 15 December 2041 at 13:32.

Wolf Moon after 15 days

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2042 after 15 days on 6 January 2042 at 08:54.

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 ∠1846"

Lunar disc appears visually 5.5% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1846" and ∠1951".

Lunation 518 / 1471

The Moon is 27 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 518 of Meeus index or 1471 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.6 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 14 hours and 30 minutes and it is 1 hour and 54 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 1 hour and 46 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 17 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠265.9°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠265.9° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠300.9°.

Moon before perigee

6 days since point of apogee on 15 December 2041 at 07:09 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 5 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 27 December 2041 at 09:54 in ♒ Aquarius.

Distance to Moon 388 285 km

The Moon is 388 285 km (241 269 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 5 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 368 408 km (228 918 mi).

Moon after descending node

2 days after descending node on 18 December 2041 at 23:35 in ♎ Libra the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 10 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 31 December 2041 at 22:59 in ♈ Aries.

Moon before southern standstill

12 days since the last northern standstill on 9 December 2041 at 04:59 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠27.747° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 2 days to face maximum declination of ∠-27.725° at the point of next southern standstill on 23 December 2041 at 14:23 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

16 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.

Syzygy in 1 day

In 1 day on 23 December 2041 at 08:06 in ♑ Capricorn 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