Crews pulled the wreckage of a World War II-era P-47 Thunderbolt from the Hudson River on Saturday morning as authorities began probing the cause of the deadly crash.

The plane’s pilot, Bill Gordon, 56, was experienced flying vintage plans and known among his fellow pilots for the care he took.

Even the crash that took his life showed evidence of his flying experience, said Scott Klyman, a board member of the American Airpower Museum in Farmingdale.

“He made a textbook water landing for an aircraft that had lost power,” Klyman said.

Gordon survived another crash of a vintage plane in 2009. He walked away when the replica biplane he flew from the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome upstate crashed.

In that crash, the biplane stalled at an altitude of about 300 feet, and Gordon was forced to land in a swamp.

Gordon “didn’t mess up,” said Billy Segalla, who taught him to fly in the 1980s. “Something had to have happened with the plane.”

Gordon, who ran a trucking and excavation business, is survived by a son and daughter. His wife died of lung cancer last year, said friends.

The wreckage of the downed plane seemed remarkably intact. Crews moved it to the Port Authority downtown heliport, where it will be stored temporarily.