The fluidelastic vibration of a tube array caused by cross flow has been studied with a correspondence to a physical image. It is shown that an unstable vibration caused by a negative damping fluid force can be computed on the assumption that the unsteady fluid force acting on a tube in a tube array is calculated by the combination between the movement of the tube and the separation point along the tube surface, which is based on a visualized test. The boundary of the instability shows a reasonable coincidence with the other published data.