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

Last Quarter in Sagittarius

Last Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 54% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 21 days old.

* The exact date and time of this Last Quarter phase is on 21 March 2063 at 20:16 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at midnight and sets at noon. It is visible to the south in the morning.

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 ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is leaving the last ∠3° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♑ Capricorn later.

Pink Moon after 22 days

Next Full Moon is the Pink Moon of April 2063 after 22 days on 13 April 2063 at 02:34.

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 ∠1803"

Lunar disc appears visually 6.6% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1803" and ∠1926".

Lunation 781 / 1734

The Moon is 21 days old and navigating through the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 781 of Meeus index or 1734 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.72 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 17 hours and 12 minutes and it is 3 hours and 10 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 4 hours and 28 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 35 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠204.9°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠204.9° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠234.9°.

Moon before apogee

8 days since point of perigee on 13 March 2063 at 05:45 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 3 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 25 March 2063 at 07:06 in ♒ Aquarius.

Distance to Moon 397 540 km

The Moon is 397 540 km (247 020 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 3 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 405 402 km (251 905 mi).

Moon before ascending node

7 days after descending node on 13 March 2063 at 22:26 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 6 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 27 March 2063 at 21:01 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon at southern standstill

At 12:26 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach South declination of ∠-28.488°. Over the upcoming 14 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt northward to face maximum declination of ∠28.415° at the point of next northern standstill in ♊ Gemini on 4 April 2063 at 23:41.

Draconic month

20 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♓ Pisces the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 8 days

In 8 days on 30 March 2063 at 00:50 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