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

Waning Gibbous in Libra

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 60% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 21 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the evening and sets in the morning. It is visible to the southwest and it is high in the sky after midnight.

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 ♎ Libra

Moon is passing about ∠14° of ♎ Libra tropical zodiac sector.

6 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 6 days on 7 January 2069 at 13:43.

Wolf Moon before 6 days

Next Full Moon is the Snow Moon of February 2069 after 22 days on 6 February 2069 at 05:29.

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 ∠1768"

Lunar disc appears visually 9.8% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1951".

Lunation 853 / 1806

The Moon is 21 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 853 of Meeus index or 1806 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.58 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 13 hours and 52 minutes and it is 2 hours and 11 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 1 hour and 8 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 55 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠279.4°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠279.4° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠310.8°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 12:33 about 27 days since last perigee on 17 December 2068 at 15:04 in ♎ Libra the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 11 days until point of next perigee on 26 January 2069 at 07:47 in ♓ Pisces.

Distance to Moon 404 393 km

This apogee Moon is 404 393 km (251 278 mi) away from Earth. It is 1 015 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 2 316 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon before ascending node

11 days after descending node on 3 January 2069 at 11:40 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 3 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 17 January 2069 at 13:49 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon before southern standstill

9 days since the last northern standstill on 5 January 2069 at 11:24 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠20.637° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 5 days to face maximum declination of ∠-20.561° at the point of next southern standstill on 19 January 2069 at 21:30 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

24 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 8 days

In 8 days on 23 January 2069 at 03:36 in ♒ Aquarius 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