Bob Moler's Ephemeris Blog

This is Bob Moler with Ephemeris for Monday, March 3rd. Today the Sun will be up for 11 hours and 17 minutes, setting at 6:33, and it will rise tomorrow at 7:14. The Moon, 3 days before first quarter, will set at 11:40 this evening.

Tonight the moon will be four days old. The age of the moon is the number of days since the new moon which ranges from 1 to 28 or 29 for the lunar month. I usually don’t use that, being more concerned with the phase of the Moon so at the top of the program I give the moon’s relation to its new, quarter, or full phase. Being in its waxing crescent phase right now, the only features to the naked eye on the Moon besides the crescent itself are the dark Sea of Crises, Mare Crisium, target of Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Lander, and the larger Sea of Fruitfulness, Mare Fecunditatis. The Moon rotates about 1/28th the speed of the Earth, and it’s also smaller, about a quarter of the Earth’s diameter. So one would have to use a supersonic jet to fly around the Earth to keep up with the rotation, but on the Moon one could do that with the Apollo moon rover.

The astronomical event times given are for the Traverse City/Interlochen area of Michigan (EST, UT – 5 hours). Times will be different for other locations.

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