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

Waning Crescent in Sagittarius

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 16% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 25 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 is entering ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is passing first ∠1° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector.

3 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 3 days on 3 January 2089 at 18:00.

Wolf Moon after 18 days

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2089 after 18 days on 26 January 2089 at 11:25.

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 ∠1797"

Lunar disc appears visually 8.3% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1797" and ∠1951".

Lunation 1100 / 2053

The Moon is 25 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 1100 of Meeus index or 2053 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.81 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 19 hours and 26 minutes and it is 28 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. This is the year's longest synodic month of 2089. 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 42 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 21 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠160.8°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠160.8° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠185.7°.

Moon before apogee

10 days since point of perigee on 28 December 2088 at 06:32 in ♋ Cancer the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 3 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 11 January 2089 at 04:23 in ♑ Capricorn.

Distance to Moon 398 959 km

The Moon is 398 959 km (247 902 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 3 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 703 km (252 714 mi).

Moon after ascending node

2 days after ascending node on 4 January 2089 at 12:45 in ♎ Libra the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 11 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 19 January 2089 at 04:30 in ♈ Aries.

Moon before southern standstill

11 days since the last northern standstill on 27 December 2088 at 04:20 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠18.933° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next day to face maximum declination of ∠-18.913° at the point of next southern standstill on 9 January 2089 at 11:54 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

2 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♎ Libra the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 4 days

In 4 days on 11 January 2089 at 20:17 in ♑ Capricorn 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