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

Waning Gibbous in Cancer

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 97% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 16 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 ♋ Cancer

Moon is leaving the last ∠2° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♌ Leo later.

1 day after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 1 day on 28 December 2069 at 00:50.

Cold Moon before 1 day

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2070 after 28 days on 26 January 2070 at 12:59.

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 ∠1912"

Lunar disc appears visually 2.1% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1912" and ∠1951".

Lunation 865 / 1818

The Moon is 16 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 865 of Meeus index or 1818 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.74 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 17 hours and 45 minutes and it is 2 hours and 15 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 5 hours and 1 minute longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 2 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠211.5°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠211.5° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠244.8°.

Moon before perigee

18 days since point of apogee on 10 December 2069 at 12:50 in ♏ Scorpio the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 2 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 31 December 2069 at 15:07 in ♌ Leo.

Distance to Moon 374 981 km

The Moon is 374 981 km (233 002 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 2 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 370 337 km (230 117 mi).

Moon after descending node

5 days after descending node on 23 December 2069 at 17:14 in ♈ Aries the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 7 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 5 January 2070 at 18:42 in ♎ Libra.

Moon after northern standstill

2 days since the last northern standstill on 27 December 2069 at 01:12 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠19.319° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 11 days to face maximum declination of ∠-19.284° at the point of next southern standstill on 10 January 2070 at 01:11 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 13 days

In 13 days on 12 January 2070 at 11:22 in ♑ Capricorn 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