diff --git a/components/freertos/tasks.c b/components/freertos/tasks.c
index 91ee39ad87..24373a91ea 100644
--- a/components/freertos/tasks.c
+++ b/components/freertos/tasks.c
@@ -3577,17 +3577,16 @@ static void prvCheckTasksWaitingTermination( void )
 
 		/* ucTasksDeleted is used to prevent vTaskSuspendAll() being called
 		too often in the idle task. */
-		taskENTER_CRITICAL(&xTaskQueueMutex);
-		while( uxTasksDeleted > ( UBaseType_t ) 0U )
+		while(uxTasksDeleted > ( UBaseType_t ) 0U )
 		{
+			TCB_t *pxTCB = NULL;
+			taskENTER_CRITICAL(&xTaskQueueMutex);
 			{
 				xListIsEmpty = listLIST_IS_EMPTY( &xTasksWaitingTermination );
 			}
 
 			if( xListIsEmpty == pdFALSE )
 			{
-				TCB_t *pxTCB;
-
 				{
 					pxTCB = ( TCB_t * ) listGET_OWNER_OF_HEAD_ENTRY( ( &xTasksWaitingTermination ) );
 					/* We only want to kill tasks that ran on this core because e.g. _xt_coproc_release needs to
@@ -3598,30 +3597,31 @@ static void prvCheckTasksWaitingTermination( void )
 						--uxTasksDeleted;
 					} else {
 						/* Need to wait until the idle task on the other processor kills that task first. */
+						taskEXIT_CRITICAL(&xTaskQueueMutex);
 						break;
 					}
 				}
+			}
+			taskEXIT_CRITICAL(&xTaskQueueMutex);
 
-				#if ( configNUM_THREAD_LOCAL_STORAGE_POINTERS > 0 ) && ( configTHREAD_LOCAL_STORAGE_DELETE_CALLBACKS )
+			if (pxTCB != NULL) {
+                #if ( configNUM_THREAD_LOCAL_STORAGE_POINTERS > 0 ) && ( configTHREAD_LOCAL_STORAGE_DELETE_CALLBACKS )
+				int x;
+				for( x = 0; x < ( UBaseType_t ) configNUM_THREAD_LOCAL_STORAGE_POINTERS; x++ )
 				{
-					int x;
-					for( x = 0; x < ( UBaseType_t ) configNUM_THREAD_LOCAL_STORAGE_POINTERS; x++ )
+					if (pxTCB->pvThreadLocalStoragePointersDelCallback[ x ] != NULL)
 					{
-						if (pxTCB->pvThreadLocalStoragePointersDelCallback[ x ] != NULL)
-						{
-							pxTCB->pvThreadLocalStoragePointersDelCallback[ x ](x, pxTCB->pvThreadLocalStoragePointers[ x ]);
-						}
+						pxTCB->pvThreadLocalStoragePointersDelCallback[ x ](x, pxTCB->pvThreadLocalStoragePointers[ x ]);
 					}
 				}
-				#endif
-				prvDeleteTCB( pxTCB );
+                #endif
+	    		prvDeleteTCB( pxTCB );
 			}
 			else
 			{
 				mtCOVERAGE_TEST_MARKER();
 			}
 		}
-		taskEXIT_CRITICAL(&xTaskQueueMutex);
 	}
 	#endif /* vTaskDelete */
 }