Gibbous ♎ Libra
First Quarter is the lunar phase on . Seen from Earth, illuminated fraction of the Moon surface is 54% and growing larger. The 8 days young Moon is in ♎ Libra.
* The exact date and time of this First Quarter phase is on 19 June 2010 at 04:30 UTC.
Moon rises at noon and sets at midnight. It is visible high in the southern sky in early evening.
Moon is passing first ∠2° of ♎ Libra tropical zodiac sector.
Lunar disc appears visually 3.5% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1956" and ∠1888".
Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon of June 2010 after 6 days on 26 June 2010 at 11:30.
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.
The Moon is 8 days young. Earth's natural satellite is moving through the first part of current synodic month. This is lunation 129 of Meeus index or 1082 from Brown series.
The length of the lunation is 29 days, 8 hours and 26 minutes. It is 58 minutes longer than the next lunation's length. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to decreasing with the true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at perigee (∠0° or ∠360°).
The length of the current synodic month is 4 hours and 18 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 51 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.
At the beginning of the lunation cycle the true anomaly is ∠311.3°. At the beginning of next synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠332.7°.
3 days after point of perigee on 15 June 2010 at 14:54 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 11 days, until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 1 July 2010 at 10:12 in ♓ Pisces.
The Moon is 366 365 km (227 649 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 11 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 405 036 km (251 678 mi).
5 days after descending node on 13 June 2010 at 21:54 in ♋ Cancer. The Moon is located south of the ecliptic over the following 7 days, until the lunar orbit crosses from South to North in ascending node on 27 June 2010 at 01:19 in ♑ Capricorn.
19 days since the beginning of current draconic month in ♑ Capricorn, the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the cycle.
7 days since the previous standstill on 12 June 2010 at 07:06 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠25.030°, the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 5 days to face maximum declination of ∠-25.038° at the point of next southern standstill on 25 June 2010 at 05:09 in ♐ Sagittarius.
In 6 days on 26 June 2010 at 11:30 in ♑ Capricorn 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.