From a Northern perspective, 4.5 kms is the distance we were on sol ~400 about 1.5 km south of Endurance.
Beacon was not visible by then, I mean we didn't see it at this time

Yeah, that's a good point. Our first glimpse of the Beacon was on sol 775, when we were only about 1.8 km from the Beacon. The topography is definitely working to our advantage from the south.

At the bottom of the image:
http://qt.exploratorium.edu/mars/opportuni...NLP2572L5M1.JPG
Are those chips from Mackinac?

Really not much of a beacon from this vantage point. If we had originally approached Victoria from the south, I expect it would have been named the Lump, or some such thing.

Almost certainly...

I think Mackinac is my new favorite meteorite of all time; incredible imagery, all!!!

Great eyes, Rui, & thanks for the illuminating close-up, Stu. Hmm...weathering & possibly transport (via covering & uncovering of aeolian deposits?) of fairly hefty hunks of iron. Mac has been there quite awhile indeed!

I suspect those are chips from Machinac.

But how did they get so far away from the meteorite? Certainly the wind did not blow them there. They are too big. Some sort of weathering is involved here but it cannot be just wind. That leaves the possibility of water or ice. Or they might have fell off immediate upon impact; but that would mean a somewhat or relatively soft landing for them to be that close. If wind is responsible, then it must have been a lot stronger than today - and I cannot imagine that without more evidence to suggest the extreme difference that would be necessary.

Just do a random walk of 1 mm/year for a billion years and moving a meter doesn't seem too difficult.

On what basis do you make this claim.

Almost everything we see at Meridiani is the result of what the wind has been doing, given several billion years to do it.

Wind combined with the tiny tap of dust bouncing along the ground in high wind speeds would, over time, move small metal pieces like that. Why wouldn't it.

The pieces are far too big. Physics tells us that it is impossible to move them given the wind forces on Mars Today. They would have to have been far stronger in the past. A millimeter a year is highly unlikely given the size of those pieces. If they were a tenth the size, then maybe.

The wind does make small changes but we are talking about much smaller scales that add up after millions and perhaps billions of years time. Moving grain size or smaller particles on Mars is a lot different than whole pieces that are several inches long and not round. Thinking that such large pieces are going move like that stretches the bounds of credibility. On Mars, a millimeter per year for such a sized piece might as well be a mile.

Something moved them, but not the current wind patterns. I made some credible suggestions. Here is another. A blast from a different impact would probably make a huge difference; but there is evidence of many around here. Multiple blast would likely move them a lot farther than they appear to have traveled. You would then have to explain how these pieces remain within a meter of the source meteorite. But now we are assuming the source. We don't know that for sure.

You seem to forget that these pieces are sitting on dust/sand/blueberries which clearly move as seen on time frames of only a week by the rovers in the dust storms. Why with the grains of sand under them moving around does it seem impossible to imagine them moving a mm in a year? If the wind blows the grains under them out, they will eventually topple and slide a bit. Do this ever year for a billion years and you can move quite a distance. Also, think of large (>1000 kg) erratic boulders on earth that move hundred of feet. By your arguments, nothing bigger 1 kg should ever move on a planet surface.

Maybe in a billion years they are quantum tunneling from one place to the next

Really?

Where?

We've seen rover tracks nearly vanish overnight.

We've seen blueberries re-excavated after being burried by rover wheels within a year.

You underestimate what the wind, and time, can do.

Or the piece(s) might broken off finally from Mackinac shortly before they landed - after the hot ride through the atmosphere. Quasi a mini scatter field here

New 'astro-poem' celebrating Mackinac...

http://twitpic.com/m8m22/full

Poetry dude, I've told this in another place...don't take it wrong but...cancer?!
Sorry but that word didn't gave a good feeling...poor Mackinac...

EDITED: Just read your answer in the other place Stu...