diff --git a/tools/catalyst-auto b/tools/catalyst-auto
index 3ee19d15..9624cebb 100755
--- a/tools/catalyst-auto
+++ b/tools/catalyst-auto
@@ -542,6 +542,9 @@ run_catalyst_commands() {
 		for i in ${!specs_var} ${!optional_specs_var}; do
 			LOGFILE="${TMPDIR}/log/$(echo "${i}" | sed -e 's:/:_:' -e 's:\.spec$::')_purge.log"
 			specpath=$(readlink -f "${i}")
+			# Bail out of cleaning (eg) stage3-openrc.spec failure if
+			#  CLST_AUTO_NOCLEAN="stage3-openrc.spec" is set
+			[[ ${CLST_AUTO_NOCLEAN} == *${i}* ]] ||
 			run_cmd "${LOGFILE}" "${timeprefix[@]}" catalyst --purgetmponly -c "${CATALYST_CONFIG}" -f "${specpath}"
 		done
 		update_symlinks