  We consider the motion of a collection of fluid loaded elastic plates,
situated horizontally in an infinitely long channel. We use a new, unified
approach to boundary value problems, introduced by A.S. Fokas in the late
1990s, and show the problem is equivalent to a system of 1-parameter integral
equations. We give a detailed study of the linear problem, providing explicit
solutions and well-posedness results in terms of standard Sobolev spaces. We
show that the associated Cauchy problem is completely determined by a matrix,
which depends solely on the mean separation of the plates and the horizontal
velocity of each of the driving fluids. This matrix corresponds to the
infinitesimal generator of the semigroup for the evolution equations in Fourier
space. By analysing the properties of this matrix, we classify necessary and
sufficient conditions for which the problem is asymptotically stable.
