The paper is devoted to the analysis of a non-stationary rigid body interaction in a fluid flow. Initially, an approximate method for determining the forces due to fluid interaction with the rigid body is offered. For this purpose, the plane movement of a mechanical system with an infinite DOF (degrees of freedom) is reduced to 5 DOF motion: 3 DOF for the body and 2 DOF for the areas of compression and vacuum in fluid flow. Differential equations of non-stationary motion are formed by the laws of classical mechanics. The use of an approximate method has been quantified by computer modelling. The average difference in results was found to be small (< 5%). The analysis of the fluid (air) interaction is carried out for a rigid body of two simple geometries -flat plate and diamond. The results obtained are used to refine the parameters of the proposed approximate method that is addressed in the present study for fluid interaction with the non-stationary rigid body. Theoretical results obtained in the final section are used in the analysis of the movement of prismatic bodies in order to obtain energy from the fluid flow.