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

First Quarter in Libra

First Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 53% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 8 days young.

* The exact date and time of this First Quarter phase is on 18 June 2059 at 03:55 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at noon and sets at midnight. It is visible high in the southern sky in early evening.

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 ♎ Libra

Moon is passing first ∠1° of ♎ Libra tropical zodiac sector.

Strawberry Moon after 7 days

Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon of June 2059 after 7 days on 25 June 2059 at 18:12.

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 ∠1773"

Lunar disc appears visually 6.3% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1773" and ∠1888".

Lunation 735 / 1688

The Moon is 8 days young and navigating through the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 735 of Meeus index or 1688 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.5 days

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

The length of the current synodic month is 43 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 27 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠84.4°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠84.4° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠119.3°.

Moon after apogee

1 day since point of apogee on 17 June 2059 at 01:27 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 10 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 29 June 2059 at 00:49 in ♒ Aquarius.

Distance to Moon 404 359 km

The Moon is 404 359 km (251 257 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 10 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 366 101 km (227 485 mi).

Moon before descending node

9 days after ascending node on 8 June 2059 at 12:58 in ♉ Taurus 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 22 June 2059 at 23:01 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon after northern standstill

6 days since the last northern standstill on 11 June 2059 at 17:24 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠26.629° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 7 days to face maximum declination of ∠-26.615° at the point of next southern standstill on 26 June 2059 at 01:24 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

9 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♉ Taurus the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 7 days

In 7 days on 25 June 2059 at 18:12 in ♐ Sagittarius 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