diff --git a/c2rust-ast-exporter/src/AstExporter.cpp b/c2rust-ast-exporter/src/AstExporter.cpp
index e013bc6e4f..d5e9e7b68e 100644
--- a/c2rust-ast-exporter/src/AstExporter.cpp
+++ b/c2rust-ast-exporter/src/AstExporter.cpp
@@ -189,6 +189,24 @@ class TypeEncoder final : public TypeVisitor<TypeEncoder> {
           astEncoder(ast) {}
 
     void VisitQualType(const QualType &QT) {
+        if(isa<AtomicType>(QT)) {
+            // No printC11AtomicError available here and no location
+            // information either -- should better have been caught at the
+            // caller, but catching it here is still better than the
+            // nondescript error messages that would come later.
+            std::string msg = "C11 Atomics are not supported. No precise "
+                "location information available. Aborting.";
+
+            auto &DiagEngine = Context->getDiagnostics();
+            // Prefix warnings with `c2rust`, so the user can distinguish
+            // our warning messages from those generated by clang itself.
+            const auto ID = DiagEngine.getCustomDiagID(DiagnosticsEngine::Error,
+                "c2rust: %0");
+            DiagEngine.Report(SourceLocation::getFromRawEncoding(0), ID).AddString(msg);
+
+            abort();
+        }
+
         if (!QT.isNull()) {
             auto s = QT.split();
 
@@ -2188,6 +2206,17 @@ class TranslateASTVisitor final
                          cbor_encode_boolean(array, D->isImplicit());
                      });
 
+        if(isa<AtomicType>(typeForDecl)) {
+            // This case is especially checked as that's what happens when
+            // clang's stdatomic.h is traversed. Other callers of VisitQualType
+            // could get the same check to preserve the location information
+            // available in Decl but not in Type, but those are more likely not
+            // to be hit, and can fall back to the less descriptive error from
+            // inside there.
+            printC11AtomicError(D);
+            abort();
+        }
+
         typeEncoder.VisitQualType(typeForDecl);
 
         return true;