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

Waxing Gibbous in Sagittarius

Waxing Gibbous on . Illuminated surface of the Moon is 89% and growing larger. Lunar cycle is 11 days young.

Moonrise and moonset

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.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon in ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is passing about ∠18° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector.

4 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 4 days on 15 July 2051 at 23:21.

Buck Moon after 3 days

Next Full Moon is the Buck Moon of July 2051 after 3 days on 23 July 2051 at 16:36.

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 ∠1816"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.9% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1816" and ∠1888".

Lunation 637 / 1590

The Moon is 11 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 637 of Meeus index or 1590 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.46 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 10 hours and 56 minutes and it is 2 hours and 32 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 48 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 21 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠70.2°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠70.2° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠104.1°.

Moon after apogee

4 days since point of apogee on 15 July 2051 at 16:49 in ♎ Libra the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 7 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 28 July 2051 at 00:46 in ♈ Aries.

Distance to Moon 394 690 km

The Moon is 394 690 km (245 249 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 7 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 368 220 km (228 801 mi).

Moon after ascending node

4 days after ascending node on 16 July 2051 at 09:35 in ♎ Libra 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 29 July 2051 at 18:33 in ♈ Aries.

Moon at southern standstill

At 20:52 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach South declination of ∠-19.133°. Over the upcoming 13 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt northward to face maximum declination of ∠19.057° at the point of next northern standstill in ♊ Gemini on 2 August 2051 at 19:38.

Draconic month

4 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♎ Libra the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 3 days

In 3 days on 23 July 2051 at 16:36 in ♑ Capricorn 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