Daytime Moonwalk

Before I lost my old phone, the last photo I took had the moon and the sun in the same frame. I was quite astonished that it was possible. My friend (who was with me when I took the pic) said, he has marked the same thing quite a few times. I began noticing the same a lot of days. But isn’t the moon supposed to come out only at nights?

Why Does the Moon Appear During the Daytime?

If you watch the moon closely for nearly a month, you will notice it gradually changing shape, from a crescent to a full circle and back. If you pay close attention, you can also note that it changes its position in the sky. Apart from the regular sunrise and sunset that occurs for the sun, the moon also has moonrise and moonset times when it enters and exits the sky (walks along the skyview - the famous Moonwalk I reckon).

The Moon rises on an average 50 minutes later each day in Earth’s skies due to the difference in Earth’s rotation and Moon’s revolution. Moon completes one orbit around Earth in 28 days, moving 13 degrees every day. Hence, the Earth has to rotate an extra 13 degrees every day after completing one rotation for the Moon to be visible.

This delay leads to the moon rising at different times during the day throughout a given month. On some days, the moon strictly rises in the night (after the sunset), while on other days, it rises well before the sunset (or even sunrise at times!). Here is a website where you can check the moonrise and moonset times for your location (it’s set to New Delhi for now, you can change that).

Even during the day, the moon can reflect light from the sun and thus, appear bright enough (as it is much closer compared to the sun) to be visible to us. It even beats the other stars in this regard. Our moon is awesome!