diff --git a/src/mcbe/assets/bin/maint b/src/mcbe/assets/bin/maint
index ead467b..d81056d 100755
--- a/src/mcbe/assets/bin/maint
+++ b/src/mcbe/assets/bin/maint
@@ -33,7 +33,13 @@ if [[ 10#$hour -eq 1 ]]; then
     # if no players are present, restart the server
     # should help deal with any memory leaks or other bugs
     players=""
+    tries = 0
     while [[ -z $players ]]; do
+        if [[ $tries -eq 10 ]]; then
+            echo "Error: failed to get number of players present after 10 tries."
+            players=10
+            break
+        fi
         players=$(mcbe-exec list | head -n 1 | cut -d ' ' -f 3 | cut -d '/' -f 1)
     done
     if [[ $players -eq 0 ]]; then