December 20 Daily Correspondence Digest for the Northern Hemisphere’s Moon Phase and Planetary Positions

You can use this link to go forward or backward in time for Moon phase information. If you are curious you can even find out what phase the Moon was in when you or anyone else, you know was on the date the person was born.

From Moongiant.com

The Moon’s current phase for today and tonight is a Waning Gibbous Phase. This is the first phase after the Full Moon occurs. It lasts roughly 7 days with the Moon’s illumination growing smaller each day until the Moon becomes a Last Quarter Moon with an illumination of 50%. The average Moon rise for this phase is between 9pm and Midnight depending on the age of the phase. The moon rises later and later each night setting after sunrise in the morning. During this phase the Moon can also be seen in the early morning daylight hours on the western horizon.

Visit the December 2021 Moon Phases Calendar to see all the daily moon phase for this month.

Today’s Waning Gibbous Phase

The Waning Gibbous on December 20 has an illumination of 98%. This is the percentage of the Moon illuminated by the Sun. The illumination is constantly changing and can vary up to 10% a day. On December 20 the Moon is 15.94 days old. This refers to how many days it has been since the last New Moon. It takes 29.53 days for the Moon to orbit the Earth and go through the lunar cycle of all 8 Moon phases.

The 8 Lunar Phases

There are 8 lunar phases the Moon goes through in its 29.53 days lunar cycle. The 4 major Moon phases are Full Moon, New Moon, First Quarter and Last Quarter. Between these major phases, there are 4 minor ones: the Waxing Crescent, Waxing Gibbous, Waning Gibbous and Waning Crescent. For more info on the Moon Cycle and on each phase check out Wikipedia Lunar Phase page.

Phase Details

Phase: Waning Gibbous
Illumination: 98%
Moon Age: 15.94 days
Moon Angle: 0.49
Moon Distance: 403,227.68 km
Sun Angle: 0.54
Sun Distance: 147,166,822.59 km

Useful Moon Resources

Check the weather before a night of Moon gazing at weather.com

For a list of all the current meteor showers visit American Meteor Society

If you need to calculate the planetary positions for a specific use and time, click on this link

Currentplanetarypositions.com

To figure out GMT (Greenwich Mean Time) to your local time use this link

For Your Local Time and Date

Northeastern Hemisphere

The time for the Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Frankfurt, Germany, Europe

20 December 2021
04:00 pm GMT 5:00 PM CEST
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:28 Sagittarius 59
Moon:15 Cancer 02
Mercury:10 Capricorn 53
Venus:26 Capricorn 28 Rx
Mars:05 Sagittarius 05
Jupiter:28 Aquarius 26
Saturn:10 Aquarius 44
Uranus:11 Taurus 10 Rx
Neptune:20 Pisces 31
Pluto:25 Capricorn 35
True Lunar Node:01 Gemini 34 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:00 Gemini 08 Rx
Lilith (Black Moon):17 Gemini 12
Chiron:08 Aries 26
Ceres:00 Gemini 08 Rx
Pallas:13 Pisces 51
Juno:13 Capricorn 01
Vesta:18 Sagittarius 25
Eris:23 Aries 44 Rx
Fire:5
Earth:5
Air:6
Water:3
Cardinal:7
Fixed:3
Mutable:9

Northwestern Hemisphere

The time for the Custom Planetary Positions is from the local time in Chicago, Illinois, USA

December 20, 2021
11:00 pm GMT 5:00 PM CST
Zodiac: Tropical (Standard Western)

Sun:29 Sagittarius 17
Moon:18 Cancer 31
Mercury:11 Capricorn 21
Venus:26 Capricorn 27 Rx
Mars:05 Sagittarius 17
Jupiter:28 Aquarius 29
Saturn:10 Aquarius 45
Uranus:11 Taurus 10 Rx
Neptune:20 Pisces 31
Pluto:25 Capricorn 35
True Lunar Node:01 Gemini 33 Rx
Mean Lunar Node:00 Gemini 07 Rx
Lilith (Black Moon):17 Gemini 14
Chiron:08 Aries 26
Ceres:00 Gemini 05 Rx
Pallas:13 Pisces 55
Juno:13 Capricorn 08
Vesta:18 Sagittarius 35
Eris:23 Aries 44 Rx
Fire:5
Earth:5
Air:6
Water:3
Cardinal:7
Fixed:3
Mutable:9