Scheduled Ghost 14 backup crashes

I've been using Norton Ghost 14 for the last year to backup my HDD onto an external HDD. For some unclear reason, in the last month, the scheduled backup has (usually, but not quite always) produced a full blown system crash.

 

The backup is scheduled to occur in the wee hours so it is not witnessed. The log just indicates that the backup began as scheduled. A manually startup backup seems to go just fine.

 

I'm running WinXP Pro.

 

Be pleased to hear any thoughts re trouble-shooting. Thanks!