Unable to Force Mount External Drive in Terminal: Failed with 72

macos tips
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My Mac recognizes an external hard disk I connect to, but the Finder does not show it. I can see it with System Report and Disk Utility, but I cannot access or write to it. I receive the error failed with 72 when I try to force the disk to mount in Terminal. Can anyone explain what the mount failed with 72 mean and what causes the mount failed with 72 error? Besides, will I lose data and how to recover when mount failed with 72, and how to fix mount failed with 72 error on Mac?

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Based on your description, the connected external hard drive cannot be automatically mounted in Disk Utility. Therefore, you can’t access it or write data to it. The received “mount failed with 72” error indicates the system had successfully detected the drive but was unable to mount the drive on Mac, preventing you from reading and writing data to it. It is hard to identify the specific reasons of the mount failed with 72 error, but there are some common ones we summarised for reference:

  • Incorrect connection
  • File system issues
  • Encryption and permission issues
  • Hardware issues
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It is possible to lose data when you find you can’t mount the external hard drive on Mac, given that you can’t identify the exact causes and the further fixes may damage the drive data such as erasing, therefore, it is necessary to recover data from the unbootable external hard drive on Mac in advance if there is no backup and there is important data on the drive.

An unmountable and unmountable external hard drive on Mac won’t show up on the Desktop or in Finder’s sidebar so you can’t access the drive. To make the drive data visible again and recover them back, you will need the third-party data recovery software for Mac which can scan the unmountable disk and display all the scanned results for you. You can consider trying iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.

This professional data recovery software is recommended for its high recovery rate, risk-free and read-only environment, and Finder-like UI, it keeps updated to support the late macOS Sequoia and Apple silicon Macs. It enables you to free download, install, and run the software, and free preview the scanned results to find the items you want to recover.

If you want to recover data from drive mount failed with 72 using iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac, follow the steps below:

  1. Free download iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac, install, and open it on your Mac.
  2. Correctly connect the external hard drive to your Mac.
  3. Click Storage device from the sidebar and select the unmountable drive.
  4. Tap the Search for Lost Data button and wait for the scanning process to complete.
  5. Filter the scanned results and preview them.
  6. Check the box of desired items and click Recover to save them to a different location.
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By default, the external hard drive should be automatically mounted in Disk Utility. When it is unmountable and you encounter the mount failed with 72 error in Terminal, there are some possible solutions you can try.

Repair the drive with mount failed with 72

Corrupted file system and logical disk errors could be the causes of the mount failed with 72 issue. When it occurs, you can try to repair the drive to get rid of the issue. You can run First Aid in Disk Utility or run FSCK command in Terminal to check and repair disk errors.

Repair disk error using First Aid:

  1. Open Disk Utility from the Finder > Applications > Utilities.
  2. Click the View button and choose Show All Devices.
  3. Select the drive mount failed with 72 and click the First Aid button.
  4. Click Run on the pop-up window to start checking and repairing disk errors.

Repair file system errors using FSCK:

  1. Open the Terminal program from the Launchpad.
  2. Enter command diskutil list, and hit Return.
  3. Enter sudo fsck_hfs -fy /dev/diskxxx (replace “diskxxx” with the unmountable disk’s name and “hfs” with the appropriate file system).

Force mount the drive with correct Terminal commands

According to your screenshot, the Terminal returns No such file or directory and mount failed with 72, perhaps, you entered the incorrect Terminal commands for mounting the external hard drive. You can try to force mount the disk again with the steps here:

  1. Launch Terminal from the Spotlight, Launchpad, or the Utilities folder.
    1. Enter command diskutil list, and hit Return.
  3. Type diskutil mount /dev/diskxxx (replace “diskxxx” with the disk name).

Erase the external drive to make it mountable

In case you still can’t mount the drive after trying the above methods, the drive could be severely damaged. Then you can try to erase the external drive on Mac to eliminate all logical disk errors to make the drive usable again. Bear in mind, erasing will delete all drive data, make sure there is available backup or you have already recovered the data with iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac.

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Thanks, the connection is in good condition, the drive is not encrypted, and the permission is read-write to my current user account when I checked the info. I suspect there are errors related to the file system or the drive damage.

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I haven’t backed up the drive before it became unmountable and some data stored on it is really important for me! I will try the recommended data recovery software to recover the data first.

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So kind of you!!! :kissing: I will apply the methods one by one, hope that I don’t need to reformat the drive and can fix the issue without data loss.