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

Waning Crescent in Aquarius

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 4% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 27 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 ♒ Aquarius

Moon is passing about ∠25° of ♒ Aquarius tropical zodiac sector.

6 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 6 days on 2 March 2081 at 11:06.

Worm Moon after 16 days

Next Full Moon is the Worm Moon of March 2081 after 16 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 ∠1768"

Lunar disc appears visually 8.9% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1932".

Lunation 1003 / 1956

The Moon is 27 days old and navigating from the second to the final 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 at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 06:10 about 12 days since last perigee on 23 February 2081 at 06:18 in ♍ Virgo 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 23 March 2081 at 16:38 in ♍ Virgo.

Distance to Moon 406 362 km

This apogee Moon is 406 362 km (252 502 mi) away from Earth. It is 954 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 347 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon before ascending node

11 days after descending node on 24 February 2081 at 20:03 in ♍ Virgo 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 10 March 2081 at 22:30 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon after southern standstill

4 days since the last southern standstill on 3 March 2081 at 19:02 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-28.668° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 9 days to face maximum declination of ∠28.673° at the point of next northern standstill on 18 March 2081 at 10:34 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

24 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 2 days

In 2 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