diff --git a/salt/manager/tools/sbin/soup b/salt/manager/tools/sbin/soup
index 450095047..f57bf7c1c 100755
--- a/salt/manager/tools/sbin/soup
+++ b/salt/manager/tools/sbin/soup
@@ -1770,7 +1770,7 @@ create_intermediate_upgrade_verification_script() {
         local retries=20
         local retry_count=0
         local delay=180
-        local success=1
+
         while [[ $retry_count -lt $retries ]]; do
             # keep stderr with variable for logging
             heavynode_versions=$(salt -C 'G@role:so-heavynode' cmd.run 'so-elasticsearch-query / --retry 3 --retry-delay 10 | jq ".version.number"' shell=/bin/bash --out=json 2>&1)
@@ -1814,7 +1814,6 @@ create_intermediate_upgrade_verification_script() {
         local retries=20
         local retry_count=0
         local delay=180
-        local success=1
 
         while [[ $retry_count -lt $retries ]]; do
             # keep stderr with variable for logging