diff --git a/QMP/qmp-events.txt b/QMP/qmp-events.txt
index dc48cccea1..d585a8d1b6 100644
--- a/QMP/qmp-events.txt
+++ b/QMP/qmp-events.txt
@@ -43,3 +43,24 @@ Data: 'server' and 'client' keys with the same keys as 'query-vnc'.
 
 Description: Issued when the VNC session is made active.
 Data: 'server' and 'client' keys with the same keys as 'query-vnc'.
+
+7 BLOCK_IO_ERROR
+----------------
+
+Description: Issued when a disk I/O error occurs
+Data:
+
+- 'device': device name (json-string)
+- 'operation': I/O operation (json-string, "read" or "write")
+- 'action': action that has been taken, it's one of the following:
+    "ignore": error has been ignored
+    "report": error has been reported to the device
+    "stop": error caused VM to be stopped
+
+Example:
+
+{ "event": "BLOCK_IO_ERROR",
+    "data": { "device": "ide0-hd1",
+              "operation": "write",
+              "action": "stop" },
+    "timestamp": { "seconds": 1265044230, "microseconds": 450486 } }
diff --git a/monitor.c b/monitor.c
index ff22123693..19876adbc2 100644
--- a/monitor.c
+++ b/monitor.c
@@ -388,6 +388,9 @@ void monitor_protocol_event(MonitorEvent event, QObject *data)
         case QEVENT_VNC_DISCONNECTED:
             event_name = "VNC_DISCONNECTED";
             break;
+        case QEVENT_BLOCK_IO_ERROR:
+            event_name = "BLOCK_IO_ERROR";
+            break;
         default:
             abort();
             break;
diff --git a/monitor.h b/monitor.h
index b0f9270a93..e35f1e4c65 100644
--- a/monitor.h
+++ b/monitor.h
@@ -23,6 +23,7 @@ typedef enum MonitorEvent {
     QEVENT_VNC_CONNECTED,
     QEVENT_VNC_INITIALIZED,
     QEVENT_VNC_DISCONNECTED,
+    QEVENT_BLOCK_IO_ERROR,
     QEVENT_MAX,
 } MonitorEvent;