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The Moon then wanes as it passes through the gibbous moon, third-quarter moon, and crescent moon phases, before returning back to new moon. The terms old moon and new moon are not interchangeable. The "old moon" is a waning sliver (which eventually becomes undetectable to the naked eye) until the moment it aligns with the Sun and begins to wax ...
The Moon's elongation is its angular distance east of the Sun at any time. At new moon, it is zero and the Moon is said to be in conjunction. At full moon, the elongation is 180° and it is said to be in opposition. In both cases, the Moon is in syzygy, that is, the Sun, Moon and Earth are nearly aligned.
The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite.It orbits at an average distance of 384,400 km (238,900 mi), about 30 times the diameter of Earth. Tidal forces between Earth and the Moon have synchronized the Moon's orbital period (lunar month) with its rotation period at 29.5 Earth days, causing the same side of the Moon to always face Earth.
Step 1: Visit Moonglow.com. Step 2: Locate the moon phase calculator. Step 3: Enter your birthdate. The calculator should generate your moon phase with a brief description of what it means.
Ben Bussey and Paul Spudis, The Clementine Atlas of the Moon, Cambridge University Press, 2004, ISBN 0-521-81528-2. Antonín Rükl, Atlas of the Moon, Kalmbach Books, 1990, ISBN 0-913135-17-8. Ewen A. Whitaker, Mapping and Naming the Moon, Cambridge University Press, 1999, ISBN 0-521-62248-4.
So the time from one node crossing to the next (see eclipse season) is approximately a half-year less half of 19.1 days -- or about 173 days. Because the orbital plane of the Moon precesses in space, the lunar nodes also precess around the ecliptic, completing one revolution (called a draconic period or nodal period) in 18.612958 years (6,798. ...
Contrary to popular belief, the Moon should ideally not be viewed at its full phase. During a full moon, rays of sunlight are hitting the visible portion of the Moon perpendicular to the surface. As a result, there is less surface detail visible during a full moon than during other phases (such as the quarter and crescent phases) when sunlight ...
Diurnal libration is the small daily libration, an oscillation due to Earth's rotation, which carries an observer first to one side and then to the other side of the straight line joining Earth's and the Moon's centers, allowing the observer to look first around one side of the Moon and then around the other—since the observer is on Earth's ...