A space engineer who 'was working away and felt isolated' was found with almost 3,000 indecent pictures of children on his laptops, a court heard.
Clive Smith, 56, downloaded 2,747 vile, illegal images of children as young as eight-years-old, including eight classed as being of the most serious category.
Police found the pictures during a search of his Stockport home which he shares with his wife and daughter in November 2018.
They found two laptops in the living room which contained eight category A images, described as the worst kind of child abuse, 51 category B images and 2,668 category C images.
But Smith was spared jail today after Minshull Street Crown Court was told how he was working away from home and found himself 'isolated'.
This led to him downloading the pictures over a period of almost three years, the court heard.
He was handed a suspended sentence and will be made to sign the sex offenders register for seven years.
Prosecutor Carl Hargan told the court how police found the pictures during a search warrant at Smith's home on November 17, 2018.
"At his home were his wife and daughter", Mr Hargan said.
"The property was searched and a variety of equipment was seized.
"A silver laptop and a black laptop were found in the living room and these had most of the images on.
"There were eight category A images, 51 category B images and 2,668 category C images which had been downloaded between December 2015 and November 2018.
"A large number of the files were found in the recycle bin folder or had been deleted.
"The children were aged between eight and 16 years of age. The majority were aged eight to 11."
In mitigation, Katherine Pierpoint said her client - who has no previous convictions - was 'deeply ashamed' of his actions.
She said his wife and family support and 'stand by him'.
"His background and what was happening in 2015 and 2016 perhaps explain why this man found himself using the internet and downloading these images", Ms Pierpoint added.
"He has always worked hard and has a background in engineering. He has had extremely good jobs in different parts of the world.
"In 2015, he found himself working in Belgium where there were real problems with him being isolated and having no support network around him.
"He found himself on the internet and then found himself downloading these images.
"He understood himself that this was starting to become a big problem in his life.
"He is extremely ashamed and embarrassed about the effect this is now having on his family."
Smith, of Mile End Lane, Stockport, pleaded guilty to three counts of making indecent images and one count of possessing a prohibited image of a child.
Judge Bernadette Baxter said she had been persuaded to 'pull away from immediate custody' and would suspend Smith's sentence.
Sentencing, she told Smith: "It seems like whilst you were working away from your family and were dissatisfied with elements of your family life, you decided to trawl the internet and you were found with these images of children.
"Amongst those were a number of moving images.
"Real children are being abused terribly so people like you will create a market for that kind of image and receive some sort of distorted satisfaction from it.
"This is real sexual offending and you must understand that."
Smith was handed a four month prison term suspended for 18 months and 15 rehabilitation activity requirement days.
He was also made subject of a sexual harm prevention order and must sign the sex offenders register for seven years.
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