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

Waning Crescent in Aquarius

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 29% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 24 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 is entering ♒ Aquarius

Moon is passing first ∠3° of ♒ Aquarius tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 1 day on 26 March 2049 at 15:10.

Pink Moon after 20 days

Next Full Moon is the Pink Moon of April 2049 after 20 days on 18 April 2049 at 01:04.

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 2.4% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1969" and ∠1922".

Lunation 608 / 1561

The Moon is 24 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 608 of Meeus index or 1561 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.48 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 11 hours and 28 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°).

Lunation length shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 1 hour and 16 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 53 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠39.7°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠39.7° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠67°.

Moon at perigee

Moon is at perigee at 13:03 about 15 days since last apogee on 13 March 2049 at 07:24 in ♋ Cancer the lunar orbit is going to widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth over the upcoming 12 days until point of next apogee on 10 April 2049 at 03:32 in ♋ Cancer.

Distance to Moon 369 231 km

This perigee Moon is 369 231 km (229 430 mi) away from Earth. It is 6 723 km closer than the mean perigee distance, but it is still 1 125 km further than the closest perigee of 21st century.

Moon after ascending node

3 days after ascending node on 24 March 2049 at 20:47 in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 9 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 6 April 2049 at 22:31 in ♊ Gemini.

Moon after southern standstill

3 days since the last southern standstill on 25 March 2049 at 08:26 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-22.314° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 10 days to face maximum declination of ∠22.212° at the point of next northern standstill on 7 April 2049 at 13:42 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

3 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 4 days

In 4 days on 2 April 2049 at 11:39 in ♈ Aries 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