diff --git a/news/fix_pyarray_ref.rst b/news/fix_pyarray_ref.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4f2b7ca
--- /dev/null
+++ b/news/fix_pyarray_ref.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,23 @@
+**Added:**
+
+* <news item>
+
+**Changed:**
+
+* <news item>
+
+**Deprecated:**
+
+* <news item>
+
+**Removed:**
+
+* <news item>
+
+**Fixed:**
+
+* Fix memory leak in makeNdArray
+
+**Security:**
+
+* <news item>
diff --git a/src/extensions/registerconverters.cpp b/src/extensions/registerconverters.cpp
index e421487..bac7484 100644
--- a/src/extensions/registerconverters.cpp
+++ b/src/extensions/registerconverters.cpp
@@ -61,7 +61,7 @@ PyObject* makeNdArray(const double* data, std::vector<npy_intp>& dims)
     PyArrayObject* a = reinterpret_cast<PyArrayObject*>(pyarray);
     double* adata = static_cast<double*>(PyArray_DATA(a));
     std::copy(data, data + PyArray_SIZE(a), adata);
-    return bp::incref(pyarray);
+    return pyarray;
 }
 
 // CrystVector to ndarray