diff --git a/merger/src/main/java/com/metamx/druid/merger/coordinator/TaskQueue.java b/merger/src/main/java/com/metamx/druid/merger/coordinator/TaskQueue.java
index 203983ef556..fdb053c764f 100644
--- a/merger/src/main/java/com/metamx/druid/merger/coordinator/TaskQueue.java
+++ b/merger/src/main/java/com/metamx/druid/merger/coordinator/TaskQueue.java
@@ -219,6 +219,7 @@ public class TaskQueue
 
     try {
       Preconditions.checkState(active, "Queue is not active!");
+      Preconditions.checkNotNull(task, "task");
 
       // If this throws with any sort of exception, including TaskExistsException, we don't want to
       // insert the task into our queue.