diff --git a/posix/Makefile b/posix/Makefile
index 3a7719e..586d45b 100644
--- a/posix/Makefile
+++ b/posix/Makefile
@@ -94,7 +94,7 @@ tests		:= tstgetopt testfnm runtests runptests	     \
 xtests		:= bug-ga2
 ifeq (yes,$(build-shared))
 test-srcs	:= globtest
-tests           += wordexp-test tst-exec tst-spawn tst-spawn2
+tests           += wordexp-test tst-exec tst-spawn tst-spawn2 tst-spawn3
 endif
 tests-static	= tst-exec-static tst-spawn-static
 tests		+= $(tests-static)
diff --git a/posix/tst-spawn3.c b/posix/tst-spawn3.c
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e66c491
--- /dev/null
+++ b/posix/tst-spawn3.c
@@ -0,0 +1,189 @@
+/* Check if posix add file actions.
+   Copyright (C) 2016 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
+   This file is part of the GNU C Library.
+
+   The GNU C Library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
+   modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public
+   License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either
+   version 2.1 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
+
+   The GNU C Library is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
+   but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
+   MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU
+   Lesser General Public License for more details.
+
+   You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public
+   License along with the GNU C Library; if not, see
+   <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.  */
+
+#include <stdio.h>
+#include <spawn.h>
+#include <error.h>
+#include <errno.h>
+#include <stdlib.h>
+#include <string.h>
+#include <unistd.h>
+#include <sys/wait.h>
+#include <sys/resource.h>
+
+static int do_test (void);
+#define TEST_FUNCTION           do_test ()
+#include <test-skeleton.c>
+
+static int
+do_test (void)
+{
+  /* The test checks if posix_spawn open file action close the file descriptor
+     before opening a new one in case the input file descriptor is already
+     opened.  It does by exhausting all file descriptors on the process before
+     issue posix_spawn.  It then issues a posix_spawn for '/bin/sh echo $$'
+     and add two rules:
+
+     1. Redirect stdout to a temporary filepath
+     2. Redirect stderr to stdout
+
+     If the implementation does not close the file 1. will fail with
+     EMFILE.  */
+
+  struct rlimit rl;
+  int max_fd = 24;
+
+  /* Set maximum number of file descriptor to a low value to avoid open
+     too many files in environments where RLIMIT_NOFILE is large and to
+     limit the array size to track the opened file descriptors.  */
+
+  if (getrlimit (RLIMIT_NOFILE, &rl) == -1)
+    {
+      printf ("error: getrlimit RLIMIT_NOFILE failed");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  max_fd = (rl.rlim_cur < max_fd ? rl.rlim_cur : max_fd);
+  rl.rlim_cur = max_fd;
+  
+  if (setrlimit (RLIMIT_NOFILE, &rl) == 1)
+    {
+      printf ("error: setrlimit RLIMIT_NOFILE to %u failed", max_fd);
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  /* Exhauste the file descriptor limit with temporary files.  */
+  int files[max_fd];
+  int nfiles = 0;
+  for (;;)
+    {
+      int fd = create_temp_file ("tst-spawn3.", NULL);
+      if (fd == -1)
+	{
+	  if (errno != EMFILE)
+	    {
+	      printf ("error: create_temp_file returned -1 with "
+		      "errno != EMFILE\n");
+	      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+	    }
+	  break;
+	}
+      files[nfiles++] = fd;
+    }
+
+  posix_spawn_file_actions_t a;
+  if (posix_spawn_file_actions_init (&a) != 0)
+    {
+      puts ("error: spawn_file_actions_init failed");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  /* Executes a /bin/sh echo $$ 2>&1 > /tmp/tst-spawn3.pid .  */
+  const char pidfile[] = "/tmp/tst-spawn3.pid";
+  if (posix_spawn_file_actions_addopen (&a, STDOUT_FILENO, pidfile, O_WRONLY |
+					O_CREAT | O_TRUNC, 0644) != 0)
+    {
+      puts ("error: spawn_file_actions_addopen failed");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  if (posix_spawn_file_actions_adddup2 (&a, STDOUT_FILENO, STDERR_FILENO) != 0)
+    {
+      puts ("error: spawn_file_actions_addclose");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  /* Since execve (called by posix_spawn) might require to open files to
+     actually execute the shell script, setup to close the temporary file
+     descriptors.  */
+  for (int i=0; i<nfiles; i++)
+    {
+      if (posix_spawn_file_actions_addclose (&a, files[i]))
+	{
+          printf ("error: posix_spawn_file_actions_addclose failed");
+	  exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+	}
+    }
+
+  char *spawn_argv[] = { (char *) _PATH_BSHELL, (char *) "-c",
+			  (char *) "echo $$", NULL };
+  pid_t pid;
+  if (posix_spawn (&pid, _PATH_BSHELL, &a, NULL, spawn_argv, NULL) != 0)
+    {
+      puts ("error: posix_spawn failed");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  int status;
+  int err = waitpid (pid, &status, 0);
+  if (err != pid)
+    {
+      puts ("error: waitpid failed");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  /* Close the temporary files descriptor so it can check posix_spawn
+     output.  */
+  for (int i=0; i<nfiles; i++)
+    {
+      if (close (files[i]))
+	{
+	  printf ("error: close failed\n");
+	  exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+	}
+    }
+
+  int pidfd = open (pidfile, O_RDONLY);
+  if (pidfd == -1)
+    {
+      printf ("error: open pidfile failed\n");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  char buf[64];
+  ssize_t n;
+  if ((n = read (pidfd, buf, sizeof (buf))) < 0)
+    {
+      printf ("error: read pidfile failed\n");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  unlink (pidfile);
+
+  /* We only expect to read the PID.  */
+  char *endp;
+  long int rpid = strtol (buf, &endp, 10);
+  if (*endp != '\n')
+    {
+      printf ("error: didn't parse whole line: \"%s\"\n", buf);
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+  if (endp == buf)
+    {
+      puts ("error: read empty line");
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  if (rpid != pid)
+    {
+      printf ("error: found \"%s\", expected PID %ld\n", buf, (long int) pid);
+      exit (EXIT_FAILURE);
+    }
+
+  return 0;
+}
diff --git a/sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/spawni.c b/sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/spawni.c
index 866ad8b..3ad461f 100644
--- a/sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/spawni.c
+++ b/sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/spawni.c
@@ -114,6 +114,13 @@ maybe_script_execute (struct posix_spawn_args *args)
     }
 }
 
+/* Return if file descriptor is opened.  */
+static inline int
+fd_is_valid (int fd)
+{
+  return fcntl_not_cancel_2 (fd, F_GETFD) != -1 || errno != EBADF;
+}
+
 /* Function used in the clone call to setup the signals mask, posix_spawn
    attributes, and file actions.  It run on its own stack (provided by the
    posix_spawn call).  */
@@ -219,6 +226,15 @@ __spawni_child (void *arguments)
 
 	    case spawn_do_open:
 	      {
+		/* POSIX states that if fildes was already an open file descriptor,
+		   it shall be closed before the new file is opened.  This avoid
+		   pontential issues when posix_spawn plus addopen action is called
+		   with the process already at maximum number of file descriptor
+		   opened and also for multiple actions on single-open special
+		   paths (like /dev/watchdog).  */
+		if (fd_is_valid (action->action.open_action.fd))
+		  close_not_cancel (action->action.open_action.fd);
+
 		ret = open_not_cancel (action->action.open_action.path,
 				       action->action.
 				       open_action.oflag | O_LARGEFILE,
