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

Waning Gibbous in Sagittarius

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 98% 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 ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is passing about ∠14° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 1 day on 15 May 2079 at 20:58.

Flower Moon before 1 day

Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon of June 2079 after 28 days on 14 June 2079 at 12:39.

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 ∠1768"

Lunar disc appears visually 7.1% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1897".

Lunation 981 / 1934

The Moon is 16 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 981 of Meeus index or 1934 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.32 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 7 hours and 44 minutes and it is 54 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 shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 5 hours shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 9 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠341.2°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠341.2° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠356.9°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 16:24 about 15 days since last perigee on 2 May 2079 at 13:49 in ♉ Taurus the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 13 days until point of next perigee on 30 May 2079 at 23:00 in ♊ Gemini.

Distance to Moon 406 158 km

This apogee Moon is 406 158 km (252 375 mi) away from Earth. It is 750 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 551 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon after descending node

3 days after descending node on 13 May 2079 at 20:46 in ♎ Libra 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 28 May 2079 at 04:40 in ♉ Taurus.

Moon before southern standstill

12 days since the last northern standstill on 5 May 2079 at 02:09 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠28.041° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next day to face maximum declination of ∠-28.005° at the point of next southern standstill on 19 May 2079 at 06:26 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

16 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♈ Aries the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 13 days

In 13 days on 30 May 2079 at 18:41 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