diff --git a/include/chaiscript/language/chaiscript_engine.hpp b/include/chaiscript/language/chaiscript_engine.hpp
index 8ff6875e..a642f249 100644
--- a/include/chaiscript/language/chaiscript_engine.hpp
+++ b/include/chaiscript/language/chaiscript_engine.hpp
@@ -208,7 +208,7 @@ namespace chaiscript
     static bool skip_bom(std::ifstream &infile) {
         std::streamsize bytes_needed = 3;
         std::streamsize bytes_read = 0;
-        char buffer[3];
+        char buffer[3] = { '\0' };
 
         bytes_read = infile.readsome(buffer, bytes_needed);