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

Waning Gibbous in Cancer

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 97% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 16 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the evening and sets in the morning. It is visible to the southwest and it is high in the sky after midnight.

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 ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠6° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 1 day on 4 December 2044 at 23:34.

Cold Moon before 1 day

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2045 after 27 days on 3 January 2045 at 10:20.

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 ∠1969"

Lunar disc appears visually 1.1% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1969" and ∠1948".

Lunation 555 / 1508

The Moon is 16 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 555 of Meeus index or 1508 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.75 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 17 hours and 55 minutes and it is 1 hour and 37 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 11 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 52 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠126.5°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠126.5° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠156.9°.

Moon at perigee

Moon is at perigee at 08:05 about 12 days since last apogee on 24 November 2044 at 06:42 in ♑ Capricorn the lunar orbit is going to widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth over the upcoming 15 days until point of next apogee on 21 December 2044 at 20:29 in ♑ Capricorn.

Distance to Moon 359 749 km

This perigee Moon is 359 749 km (223 538 mi) away from Earth. It is 2 759 km closer than the mean perigee distance, but it is still 10 607 km further than the closest perigee of 21st century.

Moon before descending node

8 days after ascending node on 27 November 2044 at 20:02 in ♓ Pisces the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 4 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 10 December 2044 at 12:32 in ♍ Virgo.

Moon after northern standstill

1 day since the last northern standstill on 5 December 2044 at 19:56 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠28.056° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 12 days to face maximum declination of ∠-28.031° at the point of next southern standstill on 19 December 2044 at 04:38 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

8 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 12 days

In 12 days on 19 December 2044 at 08:53 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