Oil Response Company Of Australia - ORCA, Unit 5 10-16 Southey Street, Williamstown North (2026)

02/07/2026

A warm gathering to honour Dad’s life, stories, family, friendships, and legacy on what would have been his 80th birthday.
Event Overview
This celebration of life will be held on Dad’s 80th birthday as a meaningful way for family and friends to come together, remember him, share stories, and celebrate the life he lived. The tone should be heartfelt, relaxed, and personal, with space for laughter, reflection, music, photos, and memories.
Saturday 18th July 1pm
Pirates Tavern: Rear of/82 Nelson Pl, Williamstown VIC 3016

Please pass this around to anyone that would be interested in attending to celebrate Ben

Please RSVP: Narelle by email or 0405 130 843

29/06/2026

Vale Brian (BEN) Cropley

In 1996 Brian or Ben as he was better known founded The Oil Response Company of Australia
Prior to that Ben was part of the Port of Melbourne’s Emergency response team
Since 1996 Ben would have trained more oil spill operational staff and attended more oil spills than anyone in Australia
As the CEO of ORCA Ben was more Hands on at the coal face of spill response than incident management and believed that the skills of the responders, and the training that was given to them, played the biggest part of how long an incident would take to complete
At Various stages over his30 years of leadership at ORCA every state has reached out for advice on everything from equipment requirements to clean up techniques and training
Ben has also worked very closely with AMSA since 2003
Every Standard Operating Procedure for all spill response equipment used in Australia has either been written by, modified, updated, by Ben
Ben took great pride in making sure every piece of equipment under ORCA’s control was ready to go and fit for purpose, tinkering and even modifying things, to ensure they worked perfectly first time every time. This is reflected best in ORCA’s Williamstown warehouse, which houses Federal, state, and local ports assets, as well as many of ORCA’s assets
Around 2005 Ben was joined by his daughter Narelle at ORCA and by 2020 Narelle was not only the general manager but also Joint Director.
In April 2026 Ben was diagnosed with an aggressive form of Cancer and went from working on equipment on a Monday, to loosing Body motor skills by the Friday, and basically had to stop working from that time on, just a few months shy of his 80th Birthday
Ben passed Peacefully on Sunday 28th June 2026 with Family by his side
Ben was incredibly proud that his legacy in spill response was not only ORCA and its staff, but that ORCA will continue under the leadership of Narelle

06/06/2026

Thanks to Witt Marine for helping us this week. Got to love when small companies work together.

24/05/2026

ORCA are at the marinas 26 conference at Royal Pines GC on the Gold Coast
Spent some time yesterday drooling at the Sanctuary Cove Boat Show
Now 2 full Conference days

Address

Unit 5 10-16 Southey Street
Williamstown North, VIC
3016

Telephone

+61 3 9397 3511

Website

http://www.oilresponse.com.au/

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Oil Response Company Of Australia - ORCA