diff --git a/pkgs/tools/text/gawk/default.nix b/pkgs/tools/text/gawk/default.nix
index 138b4e01f78..839364ddb5b 100644
--- a/pkgs/tools/text/gawk/default.nix
+++ b/pkgs/tools/text/gawk/default.nix
@@ -10,6 +10,11 @@ stdenv.mkDerivation rec {
 
   doCheck = true;
 
+  # The libsigsegv provided with gawk has failing tests:
+  # I did like in Fedora:
+  # http://rpmfind.net//linux/RPM/fedora/devel/i386/gawk-3.1.7-2.fc13.i686.html
+  configureFlags = "--disable-libsigsegv";
+
   meta = {
     homepage = http://www.gnu.org/software/gawk/;
     description = "GNU implementation of the Awk programming language";