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

Waxing Gibbous in Virgo

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 95% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 12 days young.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the afternoon and sets after midnight to early morning. It is visible to the southeast in early evening and it is up for most of the night.

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 ♍ Virgo

Moon is passing first ∠1° of ♍ Virgo tropical zodiac sector.

4 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 4 days on 10 March 2098 at 16:01.

Worm Moon after 1 day

Next Full Moon is the Worm Moon of March 2098 after 1 day on 17 March 2098 at 07:43.

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 ∠1958"

Lunar disc appears visually 1.5% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1958" and ∠1929".

Lunation 1214 / 2167

The Moon is 12 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 1214 of Meeus index or 2167 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.66 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 45 minutes and it is 3 hours 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 3 hours and 1 minute longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 2 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠225.5°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠225.5° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠260.4°.

Moon after perigee

1 day since point of perigee on 14 March 2098 at 23:15 in ♌ Leo the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 11 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 26 March 2098 at 18:28 in ♑ Capricorn.

Distance to Moon 366 071 km

The Moon is 366 071 km (227 466 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 11 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 404 823 km (251 545 mi).

Moon before descending node

9 days after ascending node on 6 March 2098 at 10:58 in ♈ Aries the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 3 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 19 March 2098 at 05:21 in ♎ Libra.

Moon after northern standstill

3 days since the last northern standstill on 11 March 2098 at 15:13 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠28.231° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 9 days to face maximum declination of ∠-28.293° at the point of next southern standstill on 24 March 2098 at 17:32 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 1 day

In 1 day on 17 March 2098 at 07:43 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is going to be in a Full Moon geocentric opposition with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Earth-Moon 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