A distraught man ended his life by taking a running jump off the Brooklyn Bridge early Thursday, as police tried in vain to coax him off the span.

The man, with a goatee and wearing a white T-shirt and sweatpants, paced along the span and puffed on what appeared to be a cigarette around 3:40 a.m., when officers with the NYPD Emergency Service Unit were called in.

He made it midway across when he took the plunge around 4:30 a.m.

Cops pulled a body out of the Hudson River at Pier 69, near 68th Street and Bay Ridge Avenue at around 8:15 a.m., and later confirmed that it was the jumper, according to police sources.