diff --git a/hbase-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/io/encoding/EncodedDataBlock.java b/hbase-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/io/encoding/EncodedDataBlock.java
index 9e832368b5f..9e0497eeaef 100644
--- a/hbase-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/io/encoding/EncodedDataBlock.java
+++ b/hbase-common/src/main/java/org/apache/hadoop/hbase/io/encoding/EncodedDataBlock.java
@@ -165,14 +165,19 @@ public class EncodedDataBlock {
     if (compressor != null) {
       compressor.reset();
     }
-    OutputStream compressingStream = algo.createCompressionStream(
-        compressedStream, compressor, 0);
+    OutputStream compressingStream = null;
 
-    compressingStream.write(inputBuffer, offset, length);
-    compressingStream.flush();
-    compressingStream.close();
+    try {
+      compressingStream = algo.createCompressionStream(
+          compressedStream, compressor, 0);
 
-    return compressedStream.size();
+      compressingStream.write(inputBuffer, offset, length);
+      compressingStream.flush();
+
+      return compressedStream.size();
+    } finally {
+      if (compressingStream != null) compressingStream.close();
+    }
   }
 
   /**