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NEW ORLEANS (AFP)--A presidential commission officially launched its probe of the BP Plc (BP) oil spill Monday at a public meeting in New Orleans as engineers worked to fit a new cap on the gushing well about 52 miles offshore. "I wish that we had the power to bring immediate solutions to stop the oil," said Senator Bob Graham of Florida, who co-chairs the seven-member commission. "We do promise to give our very best efforts to find out what is happening and the enormous consequences of this spill on the lives and the livelihood and the culture of the Gulf region." The independent commission is tasked with investigating the causes of the spill and the effectiveness of the response, and making recommendations on ways to prevent future spills. An estimated 35,000 to 60,000 barrels of oil have been gushing out of the ruptured wellhead since the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon sank spectacularly on April 22 after a deadly explosion. Oil has washed up on beaches in all five Gulf states--Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida--closing fishing grounds and threatening scores of coastal communities with financial ruin. "Capping that well will give us an end," Rear Admiral Peter Neffenger, the deputy incident commander, told the commission. But with so much oil already in the Gulf, the cleanup and recovery operations are going to go on for quite some time, he said. "I don't know that I can put an outer bound on it," Neffenger added. There was little optimism in the room as the hearing got under way. "Even if BP caps this well tomorrow they've done so much damage to the Gulf it's a strange consolation plan," said Darwin Bond-Graham, a sociologist studying how New Orleans has recovered from Hurricane Katrina. "We can't even see the end of it until that well is capped," said Ezra Boyd, who works with the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation, which has spent years cleaning up the lake bordering New Orleans only to see it polluted again with oil from the BP spill. "It's pretty sad that residents made the sacrifices to save the lake but a big corporation can come around and with its reckless pursuit of profit set all that back for years." (END) Dow Jones Newswires July 12, 2010 11:59 ET (15:59 GMT)