 <p>Does it read the file while omitting the format argument?</p> <pre><code>x=read('g:\Work\WD\Debug\wd.txt',100,4) </code></pre> <p>I am suspecting it has something to do with your formatting string.</p> <pre><code>(5x,a2,3(5x,e12.4)) </code></pre> <p>Maybe have a look <a href="http://fortranwiki.org/fortran/show/Edit+descriptors" rel="nofollow">here</a> to learn more about Fortran format edit descriptors.</p>