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

Waning Crescent in Aries

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 25% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 24 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises after midnight to early morning and sets in the afternoon. It is visible in the early morning low to the east.

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 ♈ Aries

Moon is passing about ∠11° of ♈ Aries tropical zodiac sector.

2 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 2 days on 28 May 2073 at 17:57.

Strawberry Moon after 19 days

Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon of June 2073 after 19 days on 19 June 2073 at 18:44.

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 6.8% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1892".

Lunation 907 / 1860

The Moon is 24 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 907 of Meeus index or 1860 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.57 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 13 hours and 36 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 52 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 6 hours and 11 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠218.1°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠218.1° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠250°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 06:54 about 11 days since last perigee on 19 May 2073 at 08:24 in ♏ Scorpio the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 15 days until point of next perigee on 15 June 2073 at 21:26 in ♎ Libra.

Distance to Moon 404 858 km

This apogee Moon is 404 858 km (251 567 mi) away from Earth. It is 550 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 1 851 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon after descending node

3 days after descending node on 27 May 2073 at 15:39 in ♒ Aquarius the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 10 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 10 June 2073 at 22:06 in ♌ Leo.

Moon before northern standstill

7 days since the last southern standstill on 24 May 2073 at 00:48 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-19.521° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 7 days to face maximum declination of ∠19.587° at the point of next northern standstill on 7 June 2073 at 13:47 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

16 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 5 days

In 5 days on 5 June 2073 at 19:51 in ♊ Gemini 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