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

Waning Crescent in Virgo

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 41% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 23 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 ♍ Virgo

Moon is passing about ∠13° of ♍ Virgo tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 1 day on 23 November 2043 at 13:46.

Cold Moon after 21 days

Next Full Moon is the Cold Moon of December 2043 after 21 days on 16 December 2043 at 08:02.

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 ∠1863"

Lunar disc appears visually 4.2% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1863" and ∠1944".

Lunation 542 / 1495

The Moon is 23 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 542 of Meeus index or 1495 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.78 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 18 hours and 40 minutes and it is 31 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°).

Lunation length longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 5 hours and 55 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 7 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠154°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠154° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠179.1°.

Moon after perigee

7 days since point of perigee on 17 November 2043 at 09:11 in ♊ Gemini 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 1 December 2043 at 17:07 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 384 668 km

The Moon is 384 668 km (239 022 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 7 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 706 km (252 715 mi).

Moon before descending node

11 days after ascending node on 13 November 2043 at 02:29 in ♓ Pisces the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following day until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 25 November 2043 at 15:09 in ♍ Virgo.

Moon after northern standstill

5 days since the last northern standstill on 19 November 2043 at 05:40 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠28.494° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 8 days to face maximum declination of ∠-28.421° at the point of next southern standstill on 3 December 2043 at 07:43 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

11 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♓ Pisces the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 7 days

In 7 days on 1 December 2043 at 14:37 in ♐ Sagittarius 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