(NewsNation) — The Pentagon’s continued release of UFO files is drawing mostly positive reviews from policymakers and researchers, but observers say some of the images of unidentified anomalous phenomena, or UAP, have relatively straightforward explanations.

Take, for instance, the pictures of drifting objects seen from the Space Shuttle Columbia in 1996 as the NASA craft was in low Earth orbit. Images of the floating items were bundled in the fourth tranche of documents released Friday.

To Avi Loeb, who leads a panel of scientists advising the White House on UAP, it’s obvious the anomalies outside Columbia’s windows are just “space trash.”

“We know of 40,000 fragments from satellites that were broken down orbiting the Earth,” he told “NewsNation Prime” on Saturday. “If one object shows deviation from what we expect from gravity binding it to the Earth, then we might be curious about it, but most of those are probably just broken pieces of satellites.”

Loeb, who has spent years searching for possible extraterrestrial signatures, has described the UFO files released by the Trump administration as a “mixed bag” containing both intriguing and mundane material.

“We have to judge each case by its own merit,” Loeb said.

Don’t call balloons a UFO: Rep. Nancy Mace

U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., said she’s perplexed that some of the UFO material can be demystified so easily. One video clip released Friday, which has been described by some as a “blob,” is likely a cluster of balloons that are airborne, she told “On Balance.”

Video Player is loading.

Current Time 0:00

Duration 6:11

Loaded: 1.08%

UFO files: ‘Deep state’ may be withholding material, Rep. Mace says | On Balance

NOW PLAYING

UFO files: ‘Deep state’ may be withholding material, Rep. Mace says | On Balance

“I’m not an expert in this, but it looks like balloons, and it’s floating with the wind. Why do we say we don’t know what it is?” said Mace, a member of the House Oversight Committee and UAP congressional caucus.

Other images of UAP released by the Pentagon include star-like objects that appear to hover in the air. But Loeb and other observers have said these figures could be the result of a diffraction pattern within the camera lens.