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

Last Quarter in Pisces

Last Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 51% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 22 days old.

* The exact date and time of this Last Quarter phase is on 30 May 2081 at 15:35 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at midnight and sets at noon. It is visible to the south in the morning.

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 ♓ Pisces

Moon is passing about ∠8° of ♓ Pisces tropical zodiac sector.

Strawberry Moon after 21 days

Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon of June 2081 after 21 days on 21 June 2081 at 07:32.

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

Lunation 1006 / 1959

The Moon is 22 days old and navigating through the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 1006 of Meeus index or 1959 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.45 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 10 hours and 53 minutes and it is 2 hours and 10 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 1 hour and 51 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 18 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠265.8°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠265.8° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠298.3°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 09:21 about 12 days since last perigee on 17 May 2081 at 14:15 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 12 days until point of next perigee on 11 June 2081 at 17:00 in ♌ Leo.

Distance to Moon 404 064 km

This apogee Moon is 404 064 km (251 074 mi) away from Earth. This is the year's closest apogee of 2081. It is 1 344 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 13 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon before ascending node

12 days after descending node on 17 May 2081 at 20:00 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following day until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 31 May 2081 at 13:42 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon after southern standstill

5 days since the last southern standstill on 24 May 2081 at 19:52 in ♐ Sagittarius when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-28.376° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 8 days to face maximum declination of ∠28.340° at the point of next northern standstill on 8 June 2081 at 04:25 in ♊ Gemini.

Draconic month

26 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 7 days

In 7 days on 7 June 2081 at 09:01 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