diff --git a/src/backend/postmaster/pgstat.c b/src/backend/postmaster/pgstat.c
index 44956c15b5aae8785814751e4b6e7e114d5a5f1f..ba64f2395c08bbb227eb58899e0d8d67a423667d 100644
--- a/src/backend/postmaster/pgstat.c
+++ b/src/backend/postmaster/pgstat.c
@@ -58,6 +58,7 @@
 #include "storage/pg_shmem.h"
 #include "storage/pmsignal.h"
 #include "storage/procsignal.h"
+#include "utils/ascii.h"
 #include "utils/guc.h"
 #include "utils/memutils.h"
 #include "utils/ps_status.h"
@@ -2228,6 +2229,7 @@ static PgBackendStatus *MyBEEntry = NULL;
 static char *BackendClientHostnameBuffer = NULL;
 static char *BackendAppnameBuffer = NULL;
 static char *BackendActivityBuffer = NULL;
+static Size BackendActivityBufferSize = 0;
 
 
 /*
@@ -2310,9 +2312,12 @@ CreateSharedBackendStatus(void)
 	}
 
 	/* Create or attach to the shared activity buffer */
-	size = mul_size(pgstat_track_activity_query_size, MaxBackends);
+	BackendActivityBufferSize = mul_size(pgstat_track_activity_query_size,
+										 MaxBackends);
 	BackendActivityBuffer = (char *)
-		ShmemInitStruct("Backend Activity Buffer", size, &found);
+		ShmemInitStruct("Backend Activity Buffer",
+						BackendActivityBufferSize,
+						&found);
 
 	if (!found)
 	{
@@ -2751,6 +2756,70 @@ pgstat_get_backend_current_activity(int pid, bool checkUser)
 	return "<backend information not available>";
 }
 
+/* ----------
+ * pgstat_get_crashed_backend_activity() -
+ *
+ *	Return a string representing the current activity of the backend with
+ *	the specified PID. Like the function above, but reads shared memory with
+ *	the expectation that it may be corrupt. Returns either a pointer to a
+ *	constant string, or writes into the 'buffer' argument and returns it.
+ *
+ *	This function is only intended to be used by postmaster to report the
+ *	query that crashed the backend. In particular, no attempt is made to
+ *	follow the correct concurrency protocol when accessing the
+ *	BackendStatusArray. But that's OK, in the worst case we'll return a
+ *	corrupted message. We also must take care not to trip on ereport(ERROR).
+ *
+ *	Note: return strings for special cases match pg_stat_get_backend_activity.
+ * ----------
+ */
+const char *
+pgstat_get_crashed_backend_activity(int pid, char *buffer,
+									int len)
+{
+	volatile PgBackendStatus *beentry;
+	int			i;
+
+	beentry = BackendStatusArray;
+	for (i = 1; i <= MaxBackends; i++)
+	{
+		if (beentry->st_procpid == pid)
+		{
+			/* Read pointer just once, so it can't change after validation */
+			const char *activity = beentry->st_activity;
+			const char *activity_last;
+
+			/*
+			 * We can't access activity pointer before we verify that it
+			 * falls into BackendActivityBuffer. To make sure that the entire
+			 * string including its ending is contained within the buffer,
+			 * we subtract one activity length from it.
+			 */
+			activity_last = BackendActivityBuffer + BackendActivityBufferSize
+							- pgstat_track_activity_query_size;
+
+			if (activity < BackendActivityBuffer ||
+				activity > activity_last)
+				return "<command string corrupt>";
+
+			if (*(activity) == '\0')
+				return "<command string empty>";
+
+			/*
+			 * Copy only ASCII-safe characters so we don't run into encoding
+			 * problems when reporting the message.
+			 */
+			ascii_safe_strncpy(buffer, activity, len);
+
+			return buffer;
+		}
+
+		beentry++;
+	}
+
+	/* PID not found */
+	return "<backend information not available>";
+}
 
 /* ------------------------------------------------------------
  * Local support functions follow
diff --git a/src/backend/postmaster/postmaster.c b/src/backend/postmaster/postmaster.c
index dd7493cf9dd997543b225c2f2eb886c751dd7ab0..5476975f765484717aa5474da538e14aa0517972 100644
--- a/src/backend/postmaster/postmaster.c
+++ b/src/backend/postmaster/postmaster.c
@@ -2777,6 +2777,13 @@ HandleChildCrash(int pid, int exitstatus, const char *procname)
 static void
 LogChildExit(int lev, const char *procname, int pid, int exitstatus)
 {
+	char		activity_buffer[1024]; /* default track_activity_query_size */
+	const char *activity;
+
+	activity = pgstat_get_crashed_backend_activity(pid,
+												   activity_buffer,
+												   sizeof(activity_buffer));
+
 	if (WIFEXITED(exitstatus))
 		ereport(lev,
 
@@ -2784,7 +2791,8 @@ LogChildExit(int lev, const char *procname, int pid, int exitstatus)
 		  translator: %s is a noun phrase describing a child process, such as
 		  "server process" */
 				(errmsg("%s (PID %d) exited with exit code %d",
-						procname, pid, WEXITSTATUS(exitstatus))));
+						procname, pid, WEXITSTATUS(exitstatus)),
+				 errdetail("Running query: %s", activity)));
 	else if (WIFSIGNALED(exitstatus))
 #if defined(WIN32)
 		ereport(lev,
@@ -2794,7 +2802,8 @@ LogChildExit(int lev, const char *procname, int pid, int exitstatus)
 		  "server process" */
 				(errmsg("%s (PID %d) was terminated by exception 0x%X",
 						procname, pid, WTERMSIG(exitstatus)),
-				 errhint("See C include file \"ntstatus.h\" for a description of the hexadecimal value.")));
+				 errhint("See C include file \"ntstatus.h\" for a description of the hexadecimal value."),
+				 errdetail("Running query: %s", activity)));
 #elif defined(HAVE_DECL_SYS_SIGLIST) && HAVE_DECL_SYS_SIGLIST
 	ereport(lev,
 
@@ -2804,7 +2813,8 @@ LogChildExit(int lev, const char *procname, int pid, int exitstatus)
 			(errmsg("%s (PID %d) was terminated by signal %d: %s",
 					procname, pid, WTERMSIG(exitstatus),
 					WTERMSIG(exitstatus) < NSIG ?
-					sys_siglist[WTERMSIG(exitstatus)] : "(unknown)")));
+					sys_siglist[WTERMSIG(exitstatus)] : "(unknown)"),
+			 errdetail("Running query: %s", activity)));
 #else
 		ereport(lev,
 
@@ -2812,7 +2822,8 @@ LogChildExit(int lev, const char *procname, int pid, int exitstatus)
 		  translator: %s is a noun phrase describing a child process, such as
 		  "server process" */
 				(errmsg("%s (PID %d) was terminated by signal %d",
-						procname, pid, WTERMSIG(exitstatus))));
+						procname, pid, WTERMSIG(exitstatus)),
+				 errdetail("Running query: %s", activity)));
 #endif
 	else
 		ereport(lev,
@@ -2821,7 +2832,8 @@ LogChildExit(int lev, const char *procname, int pid, int exitstatus)
 		  translator: %s is a noun phrase describing a child process, such as
 		  "server process" */
 				(errmsg("%s (PID %d) exited with unrecognized status %d",
-						procname, pid, exitstatus)));
+						procname, pid, exitstatus),
+				 errdetail("Running query: %s", activity)));
 }
 
 /*
diff --git a/src/backend/utils/adt/ascii.c b/src/backend/utils/adt/ascii.c
index 7ecf4949b5f070c2568e066aab0622eb67c24bc4..7c9e96a04f60cd9819957762d9b326082730e254 100644
--- a/src/backend/utils/adt/ascii.c
+++ b/src/backend/utils/adt/ascii.c
@@ -158,3 +158,37 @@ to_ascii_default(PG_FUNCTION_ARGS)
 
 	PG_RETURN_TEXT_P(encode_to_ascii(data, enc));
 }
+
+/* ----------
+ * "Escape" a string in unknown encoding to a valid ASCII string.
+ * Replace non-ASCII bytes with '?'
+ * This must not trigger ereport(ERROR), as it is called from postmaster.
+ *
+ * Unlike C strncpy(), the result is always terminated with exactly one null
+ * byte.
+ * ----------
+ */
+void
+ascii_safe_strncpy(char *dest, const char *src, int len)
+{
+	int			i;
+
+	for (i = 0; i < (len - 1); i++)
+	{
+		unsigned char ch = src[i];	/* use unsigned char here to avoid compiler warning */
+
+		if (ch == '\0')
+			break;
+		/* Keep printable ASCII characters */
+		if (32 <= ch && ch <= 127)
+			dest[i] = ch;
+		/* White-space is also OK */
+		else if (ch == '\n' || ch == '\r' || ch == '\t')
+			dest[i] = ch;
+		/* Everything else is replaced with '?' */
+		else
+			dest[i] = '?';
+	}
+
+	dest[i] = '\0';
+}
diff --git a/src/include/pgstat.h b/src/include/pgstat.h
index 20c4d4354e920fd6e761b49a2f696737b1caa3ae..d0f1927efb21218ab60e64667f2e4cfca43bcac3 100644
--- a/src/include/pgstat.h
+++ b/src/include/pgstat.h
@@ -720,6 +720,8 @@ extern void pgstat_report_appname(const char *appname);
 extern void pgstat_report_xact_timestamp(TimestampTz tstamp);
 extern void pgstat_report_waiting(bool waiting);
 extern const char *pgstat_get_backend_current_activity(int pid, bool checkUser);
+extern const char *pgstat_get_crashed_backend_activity(int pid, char *buffer,
+									int len);
 
 extern PgStat_TableStatus *find_tabstat_entry(Oid rel_id);
 extern PgStat_BackendFunctionEntry *find_funcstat_entry(Oid func_id);
diff --git a/src/include/utils/ascii.h b/src/include/utils/ascii.h
index ad70e037bd7eae328ce1d446d39c9ebab0b5efe5..adeddb5626fa9469b9ce091426e18e9003d04118 100644
--- a/src/include/utils/ascii.h
+++ b/src/include/utils/ascii.h
@@ -16,5 +16,6 @@
 extern Datum to_ascii_encname(PG_FUNCTION_ARGS);
 extern Datum to_ascii_enc(PG_FUNCTION_ARGS);
 extern Datum to_ascii_default(PG_FUNCTION_ARGS);
+extern void ascii_safe_strncpy(char *dest, const char *src, int len);
 
 #endif   /* _ASCII_H_ */