diff --git a/core/tests/Drupal/Tests/BrowserTestBase.php b/core/tests/Drupal/Tests/BrowserTestBase.php
index e7c79f380a..7318ad9a13 100644
--- a/core/tests/Drupal/Tests/BrowserTestBase.php
+++ b/core/tests/Drupal/Tests/BrowserTestBase.php
@@ -446,6 +446,15 @@ protected function registerSessions() {}
    * {@inheritdoc}
    */
   protected function setUp() {
+    // Installing Drupal creates 1000s of objects. Garbage collection of these
+    // objects is expensive. This appears to be causing random segmentation
+    // faults in PHP 5.x due to https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=72286. Once
+    // Drupal is installed is rebuilt, garbage collection is re-enabled.
+    $disable_gc = version_compare(PHP_VERSION, '7', '<') && gc_enabled();
+    if ($disable_gc) {
+      gc_collect_cycles();
+      gc_disable();
+    }
     parent::setUp();
 
     $this->setupBaseUrl();
@@ -466,6 +475,11 @@ protected function setUp() {
 
     // Set up the browser test output file.
     $this->initBrowserOutputFile();
+    // If garbage collection was disabled prior to rebuilding container,
+    // re-enable it.
+    if ($disable_gc) {
+      gc_enable();
+    }
   }
 
   /**