ImportError: DLL load failed with error code when I try to import GDAL from the Python console

Question

I've installed GDAL from the wheel files available here on Python 3.4. I'm using an old version of Python because one of the packages I need doesn't work yet on Python 3.6.

When I try to import gdal in Python with a simple from osgeo import gdal, I get the following error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in <module>
  File "C:\Python34\lib\site-packages\osgeo\__init__.py", line 41, in <module>
    _gdal = swig_import_helper()
  File "C:\Python34\lib\site-packages\osgeo\__init__.py", line 37, in swig_import_helper
    _mod = imp.load_module('_gdal', fp, pathname, description)
  File "C:\Python34\lib\imp.py", line 243, in load_module
    return load_dynamic(name, filename, file)
ImportError: DLL load failed with error code -1073741795

I'm not sure this question is a duplicate of this question which suggests to install the pre-compiled GDAL from GIS internals.

Answer 1

If you're on windows... You may need to modify your system path and variables: Add the GDAL installation directory bin folder to your system PATH BEFORE the python path it may be something like:

C:\gdalwin32-1.6\bin

Add GDAL_Data environment variable: Variable name: GDAL_DATA Variable value: C:\gdalwin32-1.6\data

Reboot your machine and then test.

Since you have a lot of niche python dependancies it may be worth-while to set up a virtual python environment and how to use python virtualenv. A virtual environment is an isolated working copy of python which allows you to work on a specific project without it affecting your other projects, therefore you ca have multiple installations of python for each project.

Answer 2

This issue was solved by sticking with the version 3.6.5 (latest as of this answer) of Python. It turns out that I didn't have to downgrade to Python 3.4 since all the libraries I was using are compatible with Python 3.6.