diff --git a/script/run.ts b/script/run.ts
index 6551aefb22d..58d0ea5cd60 100644
--- a/script/run.ts
+++ b/script/run.ts
@@ -43,3 +43,25 @@ export function run(spawnOptions: SpawnOptions) {
 
   return spawn(binaryPath, [], opts)
 }
+
+// fallback workaround for hardened linux kernel, especially Debian 10
+
+export function runNoSandbox(spawnOptions: SpawnOptions) {
+  try {
+    // eslint-disable-next-line no-sync
+    const stats = Fs.statSync(binaryPath)
+    if (!stats.isFile()) {
+      return null
+    }
+  } catch (e) {
+    return null
+  }
+
+  const opts = Object.assign({}, spawnOptions)
+
+  opts.env = Object.assign(opts.env || {}, process.env, {
+    NODE_ENV: 'development',
+  })
+
+  return spawn(binaryPath, ['--no-sandbox'], opts)
+}
diff --git a/script/start.ts b/script/start.ts
index 96fdc173cf1..2543c4e7799 100644
--- a/script/start.ts
+++ b/script/start.ts
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ import { forceUnwrap as u } from '../app/src/lib/fatal-error'
 
 import configs = require('../app/webpack.development')
 
-import { run } from './run'
+import { run, runNoSandbox } from './run'
 
 function getPortOrDefault() {
   const port = process.env.PORT
@@ -32,6 +32,31 @@ function startApp() {
     return
   }
 
+  runningApp.on('exit', (code, signal) => {
+    if (process.platform === 'linux') {
+      // attempt --no-sandbox workaround
+      const display_warning =
+        '\nWARNING: Default behavior is to abort upon sandbox error, but ' +
+        'GitHub Desktop will override to run without sandboxing.' +
+        '\nAdditional configuration may allow you to avoid seeing this error.' +
+        '\n\nPlease see more details on https://github.com/shiftkey/desktop/issues/222\n'
+      console.log(display_warning)
+      const linuxNoSandbox = runNoSandbox({ stdio: 'inherit' })
+
+      if (linuxNoSandbox != null) {
+        linuxNoSandbox.on('close', () => {
+          process.exit(0)
+        })
+      }
+    } else {
+      console.log('child process exited with code ' + code)
+    }
+  })
+
+  runningApp.on('error', (err) => {
+    console.log('failed to start process', err)
+  })
+
   runningApp.on('close', () => {
     process.exit(0)
   })