'Survivor' Still Swinging

By Stephen M. Silverman

04/30/1998 at 12:00 AM EDT

Those outdoors people are still attracting armchair adventurers. CBS's "Survivor: The Australian Outback" was easily the No. 1 program of last week, with 28.72 million viewers in 17.5 million homes, according to Nielsen. Another new show (this season) on the same network, "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" was No. 2 for the week and was especially popular among the highly coveted (by advertisers) 18-49-age group demographic. And despite rumblings that the show is losing its ratings grip, all four episodes of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" made this week's Top 10. Perhaps it's the $2 million-plus jackpot that's up for grabs -- the largest in TV history. (The rating is the percentage of the nation's estimated 102.2 million TV homes. Each ratings point represents 1,022,000 households.) The Top 10 for the week of March 5-11:

1. "Survivor: The Australian Outback," CBS, 17.1, 17.5 million homes
2. "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," CBS, 14.4, 14.7 million homes
3. "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," Wednesday, ABC, 14.0, 14.3 million homes
4. "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," Tuesday, ABC, 12.8, 13.0 million homes
5. "The Practice," ABC, 12.4, 12.7 million homes
6. "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," Sunday, ABC, 12.1, 12.4 million homes
7. "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," Thursday, ABC, 11.8, 12.1 million homes
8. (tie) "Everybody Loves Raymond," CBS, 11.7, 12.0 million homes
8. (tie) "Frasier," NBC, 11.7, 12.0 million homes
10. (tie) "60 Minutes," CBS, 10.7, 11.0 million homes
10. (tie) "Becker," CBS, 10.7, 11.0 million homes