Miguel invites Kathy and Robin to Lincoln Park Airport, where he is taking flying lessons. After a brief discussion of the four forces, Miguel acquaints himself with the plane's controls.

Kathy discovers a wounded raptor in the Minnesota woods, prompting a visit from a graduate student intent on helping the raptor.

Film insert: Different wings for different things.

A musical number, Trying To Fly, adapted from The Bee Gees' Stayin' Alive, becomes the backbone of this theme week (it reappears in Flight: Thrust. Another musical send-up, Big Birds Don't Fly, shows up here (and again in Flight: Acceleration).

THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of The Veiled Thief, Part One."" Someone has broken into a beehive, where a precious coin collection had been kept. (Concludes in next episode.)

Miguel, Robin, and Kathy join the crew of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade as they inflate balloons. Robin takes her first parachute jump.FILM INSERT: Air is there. ANIMATION: Falling paper demonstrates drag.THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of the Veiled Thief, Part Two.""

Miguel has entered himself and Robin in a boomerang-throwing competition. But neither knows how to throw a boomerang properly. They get a demonstration on boomerang flight from a professional. In California, Kathy flies an ultralight with a test pilot.Film inserts: indoor airplane flying at Columbia University leads a boy to building a model airplane; the need for great amounts of energy for birds and airplanes to fly.ANIMATION: The four forces involved in flying.THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of the Bottled Boat, Part Two."" Armed with a ticket to the Maritime Museum, the gang talks to a model shipbulider who tells all he knows about the stranger with the bottled boat. He's a regular customer, buying ships every week, always with a specially-marked pennant on the mast. (Concludes in next episode.)

Kathy brings a telescope to talk about the changing constellations in the night sky. In the process, Kathy discusses Newton's Laws of Motion. Robin visits NORAD as it observes satellites in orbit. Miguel hears how planes take off and land at an aircraft carrier.FILM INSERT: Flying objects need a lot of fuel to fly.THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of the Bottled Boat, Part Three."" The Gang deduces the pennant is marked with a microdot.

Miguel and Paco start the week in the back of a pick-up truck, riding through San Diego Wild Animal Park. They see the prehensile tongue of a giraffe up close. A worker explains how giraffes evolved to its long-necked self.

Kathy and Robin go to Magi, a 3-d computer animation studio. Christine Chang, a computer scientist, shows how masic shapes turn into complicated animal shapes.

Back at the Wild Animal Park, Miguel and Paco see how an elephant's trunk can pick up things.

FILM INSERT: Basic shapes are all over the world.

ANIMATED MUSIC VIDEO: The Way It Was shows how the continents were together millions of years ago.

BIOGRAPHY: Botanist Elma González reflects on her life and her inspiration for studying the cells of plants.

FILM INSERT: Basic shapes are all over the universe.

Back at the Wild Animal Park, Miguel and Paco emcounter a Bactrian camel. An expert explains that animal families are determined by the similarities of different animals.

THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of the Ma

From the San Diego Wild Animal Park, Miguel and Paco observe elephants flipping dust and dirt on their backs. An evolutionary expoert at the Wild Animal Park explains why elephants have large, sturdy legs.

FILM INSERT: Gravity.

Robin goes to a California logging camp see forester Becky Robertson. Robertson explains to Robin how certain trees take on some shapes due to sunlight and gravity.

FILM INSERT: Building a skyscrapers.

Jackie talks to Marvel Allen on the Golden Gate Bridge to learn the forces acting on a suspension bridge.

Back at the Wild Animal Park, Miguel and Paco find out how ostriches have survived in their environment. The evolutionary expoert also discusses the strength of an egg, any egg.

THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of the Magnetic Woman, Part Two."" Ricardo consults a magician friend to discuss the egg trick. This leads Vikki to consult Lulu Hearst's book on the real Little Georgia Magnet. It lets the Gamg expose the swindle that Billy Chatterton and his father

Miguel and Robin attach a speedometer on a bicycle so they and Paco can see how fast Paco can really ride his bike.

Jackie meets with MIT engineers who built a streamlined bicycle, the longest in the wirld.

ANIMATION: Laminar flow.

At Miguel's house, Kathy tells Robin about the odometer on a bicycle. They decide one of them rides 2,000 miles a year on a bicycle.

FILM INSERT: Streamlining isn't the only thing that lowers air resistance in high-speed travel.

Robin and Kathy find the hole in Kathy's flat tire by putting the tire in a tub full of water.

Miguel talks to Diane Green, a champion windsurfer, about sailboards. Green builds a sailboard herself and gets Miguel on another sailboard (temporarily).

FILM INSERT: The streamlined shape of salmon and other fish, beavers, penguins, and dolphins.

Robin and Kathy patch up the tire and test it in the tub.

THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of X Marks the Spot, Part One."" Vikki is entered in a village's ten-mile race. One of the runners, tho

Miguel is chopping wood because he wants to play the violin. He asks Robin to take the wood to Carlene Hutchins, who makes violins, a musical acoustician. She tells how the violin's shape determines its sound. And she makes a violin from wood strips.

FILM INSERT: Animals to evolve shapes that help them.

In Lordstown, Ohio, Miguel meets Denby, who insists he is not a robot. He invites Miguel into the Chevrolet plant to see true robots at work.

Robin, Kathy and Miguel sing Row, Row, Row Your Boat in a round as they walk from the subway to hear a string trio rehearse. At the hall, they meet the trio: Eugene Moore, Ida Kafavian and Marcus Thompson. At Miguel's request, the trio play Frere Jacques in round. All three musicians tune up to play a fugue by Bach. In a fugue, once they play the initial melody, musicians begin imitating each other.

THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of X Marks the Spot, Part Two."" Cece explains that someone has switched a map of what may be Captain Kidd's bu

Robin has her hands full trying to develop pictures in the makeshift darkroom set up in the basement. In the field, Robin gets a first-hand look on how police use fingerprints as criminal evidence. The Bloodhound Gang cracks ""The Case of X Marks the Spot.""

Paco enlists Miguel and the others to determine the length of string wound into a worn baseball. Mount Rushmore heads the set of field reports. The Bloodhound Gang is confronted with ""The Case of the Funny Money."" (Concludes in next episode.)

Miguel, Robin and Kathy begin by discussing how much paint would be needed to cover the walls in a room. Headlining the field reports is the expanding Great Salt Lake. The Bloodhound Gang cracks ""The Case of the Funny Money.""

Miguel helps Paco weigh his dog. Kathy gets a pointer on how to pan for gold. In ""The Bloodhound Gang,"" a mann claiming to be an ex-tennis player hires the Gang to search for a man with a shaved head.

Miguel, Robin, and Kathy are in the midst of conducting a survey on how people try to cure their hiccups. The Bloodhound Gang discovers the identities of their client and the man he seeks in Part Two of ""The Case of the Human Whale.""

Paco and the others stage a race between a snail, a turtle, a worm, and a millipede. Robin sees a biologist studying animal locomotion. Astronaut Charlie Bolden shows Miguel a computerized shuttle simulator. Kathy gets an elementary physics lesson riding a free-fall ride at Six Flags Over Texas. In the last installment of Paco's Bureau of Standards, Paco measures the speed of speech with fast-talker John Moschitta.Film inserts: The speeds of various animals, people, and other devices; gestation periods of selected animals.THE BLOODHOUND GANG: ""The Case of the Human Whale, Part Three."" Vikki determines that the Human Whale always centers around one parking garage. It's the key to catching both the Human Whale and Flash Jordan.

The show begins at ""Maggie's Machine Shop,"" where Maggie discusses pulleys. In Barre, Vermont, we see how granite is removed from a quarry and polished. In Paris, Todd and Monique examine the elevators at the Eiffel Tower. David and Chantal get a tip on riding bicycles.Film insert: a canal lock system.

David rides a bicycle with a skeleton at a Paris science museum. Robin visits veterinary radiologists in action. At Cal State Long Beach, Diego witnesses track students' video analyses.

Robin, Paco, and Mary learn about the illusion of impact in stunts. In Vitry sur Seine (near Paris), Chantal visits a collision research area to observe the buffers on high-speed trains. David explains how to measure the coefficient of restitution of several balls. Maggie explains the forces at work in bouncing on a trampoline. RECYCLED FROM EARLIER IN SEASON 5: Linus Pauling remembers his first science lesson: how to sharpen a pencil.FILM INSERTS: The principle of seat belts; how a kangaroo is like a rubber ball.

Friction is emphasized in demonstrations with snakes, TGV trains, and ice-gliding boats.

Leverage is discussed at sea, in a French village, and at Maggie's Mechanical Shop.