diff --git a/tests/frontend/org/voltdb/TestJSONInterface.java b/tests/frontend/org/voltdb/TestJSONInterface.java
index <HASH>..<HASH> 100644
--- a/tests/frontend/org/voltdb/TestJSONInterface.java
+++ b/tests/frontend/org/voltdb/TestJSONInterface.java
@@ -155,7 +155,16 @@ public class TestJSONInterface extends TestCase {
         out.close();
         out = null;
         conn.getOutputStream().close();
-        int responsCode = conn.getResponseCode();
+        int responsCode = 200;
+        IOException rcexp = null;
+        try {
+            responsCode = conn.getResponseCode();
+        } catch (IOException e) {
+            rcexp = e;
+        }
+        if (rcexp != null) {
+            throw rcexp;
+        }
 
         BufferedReader in = null;
         try {
ENG-<I> fickle URLConnection response code probing