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 35% 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 ♒ Aquarius

Moon is leaving the last ∠1° of ♒ Aquarius tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♓ Pisces later.

1 day after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 1 day on 29 April 2054 at 20:46.

Flower Moon after 20 days

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2054 after 20 days on 21 May 2054 at 15:16.

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 ∠1771"

Lunar disc appears visually 7.2% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1771" and ∠1904".

Lunation 671 / 1624

The Moon is 23 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 671 of Meeus index or 1624 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.52 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 12 hours and 28 minutes and it is 2 hours and 48 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 shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 16 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 53 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠254.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠254.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠288.9°.

Moon after apogee

1 day since point of apogee on 30 April 2054 at 05:45 in ♒ Aquarius the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 11 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 13 May 2054 at 03:26 in ♌ Leo.

Distance to Moon 404 719 km

The Moon is 404 719 km (251 481 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 11 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 369 431 km (229 554 mi).

Moon before descending node

13 days after ascending node on 18 April 2054 at 05:03 in ♍ Virgo 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 2 May 2054 at 00:18 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon after southern standstill

4 days since the last southern standstill on 27 April 2054 at 01:47 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-18.930° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 9 days to face maximum declination of ∠19.033° at the point of next northern standstill on 11 May 2054 at 05:32 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

13 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♍ Virgo the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 6 days

In 6 days on 7 May 2054 at 17:00 in ♉ Taurus 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