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

Waxing Gibbous in Cancer

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 89% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 11 days young.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the afternoon and sets after midnight to early morning. It is visible to the southeast in early evening and it is up for most of the night.

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 passing about ∠23° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

4 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 4 days on 15 February 2073 at 06:57.

Snow Moon after 2 days

Next Full Moon is the Snow Moon of February 2073 after 2 days on 22 February 2073 at 07:26.

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 1.5% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1912" and ∠1940".

Lunation 904 / 1857

The Moon is 11 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 904 of Meeus index or 1857 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.77 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 18 hours and 35 minutes and it is 37 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. This is the year's longest synodic month of 2073. 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 5 hours and 51 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 12 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠140.9°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠140.9° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠168.4°.

Moon before perigee

8 days since point of apogee on 10 February 2073 at 19:47 in ♓ Pisces the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 3 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 23 February 2073 at 05:00 in ♍ Virgo.

Distance to Moon 374 829 km

The Moon is 374 829 km (232 908 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 3 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 358 210 km (222 581 mi).

Moon before ascending node

11 days after descending node on 8 February 2073 at 00:44 in ♓ Pisces the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 2 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 22 February 2073 at 01:28 in ♍ Virgo.

Moon after northern standstill

1 day since the last northern standstill on 18 February 2073 at 09:14 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.995° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 11 days to face maximum declination of ∠-19.001° at the point of next southern standstill on 2 March 2073 at 23:21 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 2 days

In 2 days on 22 February 2073 at 07:26 in ♍ Virgo 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