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 88% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 18 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 ∠19° of ♎ Libra tropical zodiac sector.

2 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 2 days on 23 February 2081 at 14:27.

Snow Moon before 2 days

Next Full Moon is the Worm Moon of March 2081 after 26 days on 25 March 2081 at 00:29.

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 ∠1933"

Lunar disc appears visually 0.2% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1933" and ∠1937".

Lunation 1003 / 1956

The Moon is 18 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 1003 of Meeus index or 1956 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.79 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 19 hours and 1 minute and it is 2 hours and 2 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 6 hours and 16 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 47 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠177.5°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠177.5° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠202.2°.

Moon after perigee

3 days since point of perigee on 23 February 2081 at 06:18 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 9 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 8 March 2081 at 06:10 in ♒ Aquarius.

Distance to Moon 370 744 km

The Moon is 370 744 km (230 370 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 9 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 362 km (252 502 mi).

Moon after descending node

1 day after descending node on 24 February 2081 at 20:03 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 12 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 10 March 2081 at 22:30 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon before southern standstill

7 days since the last northern standstill on 19 February 2081 at 03:19 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠28.630° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 5 days to face maximum declination of ∠-28.668° at the point of next southern standstill on 3 March 2081 at 19:02 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

14 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♓ Pisces the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 12 days

In 12 days on 10 March 2081 at 15:16 in ♓ Pisces 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