1996, DIANE Publishing Company, Intelligence Threat Handbook
The principal improvements in the systems are the ability to return film canisters without deorbiting the spacecraft, and the extension of orbital […]
First, an orbiting weapon required elaborate spacecraft systems, such as retro-rockets to deorbit it, others to guide it, and still others to arm it.
[…] process will be initiated and over approximately one year the satellites will be maneuvered into an orbit that will eventually safely deorbit them.
(intransitive) Of an orbiting object, such as a satellite: to leave orbit.
The Gemini emergency occurred when Gemini 8 deorbited and landed in the Northern Pacific 1000 miles south of Japan.