diff --git a/conf/sip_profiles/internal.xml b/conf/sip_profiles/internal.xml
index b78ea20070..b803bcea6d 100644
--- a/conf/sip_profiles/internal.xml
+++ b/conf/sip_profiles/internal.xml
@@ -47,8 +47,8 @@
         Sometimes, in extremely rare edge cases, the Sofia SIP stack may stop
         responding. These options allow you to enable and control a watchdog
         on the Sofia SIP stack so that if it stops responding for the
-        specified number of milliseconds, it will cause FreeSWITCH to shut
-        down immediately. This is useful if you run in an HA environment and
+        specified number of milliseconds, it will cause FreeSWITCH to crash
+        immediately. This is useful if you run in an HA environment and
         need to ensure automated recovery from such a condition. Note that if
         your server is idle a lot, the watchdog may fire due to not receiving
         any SIP messages. Thus, if you expect your system to be idle, you
@@ -57,6 +57,8 @@
         globally for all profiles. So, if you run in an HA environment with a
         master and slave, you should use the CLI to make sure the watchdog is
         only enabled on the master. 
+        If such crash occurs, FreeSWITCH will dump core if allowed. The
+        stacktrace will include function watchdog_triggered_abort().
     -->
     <param name="watchdog-enabled" value="no"/>
     <param name="watchdog-step-timeout" value="30000"/>
diff --git a/src/mod/endpoints/mod_sofia/sofia.c b/src/mod/endpoints/mod_sofia/sofia.c
index ca9b0cd974..5a3ad76680 100644
--- a/src/mod/endpoints/mod_sofia/sofia.c
+++ b/src/mod/endpoints/mod_sofia/sofia.c
@@ -1275,6 +1275,11 @@ static void sofia_perform_profile_start_failure(sofia_profile_t *profile, char *
 	}
 }
 
+/* not a static function so that it's still visible on stacktraces */
+void watchdog_triggered_abort(void) {
+	abort();
+}
+
 #define sofia_profile_start_failure(p, xp) sofia_perform_profile_start_failure(p, xp, __FILE__, __LINE__)
 
 
@@ -1390,10 +1395,10 @@ void *SWITCH_THREAD_FUNC sofia_profile_worker_thread_run(switch_thread_t *thread
 				}
 
 				if (event_fail || step_fail) {
-					switch_log_printf(SWITCH_CHANNEL_LOG, SWITCH_LOG_CRIT, "Profile %s: SIP STACK FAILURE DETECTED!\n"
+					switch_log_printf(SWITCH_CHANNEL_LOG, SWITCH_LOG_CRIT, "Profile %s: SIP STACK FAILURE DETECTED BY WATCHDOG!\n"
 									  "GOODBYE CRUEL WORLD, I'M LEAVING YOU TODAY....GOODBYE, GOODBYE, GOOD BYE\n", profile->name);
 					switch_yield(2000000);
-					abort();
+					watchdog_triggered_abort();
 				}
 			}