• Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex: In the final episode of 2nd Gig, the Tachikomas ram the satellite containing the A.I.s into a nuclear missile to save the lives of their comrades on the ground, all while singing a happy children's song that symbolizes that they've finally learned of the concept of death, and aren't afraid to die for a good cause.
• Yu-Gi-Oh!: In the English dub, Kaiba sets the Industrial Illusions satellite to crash into their mainframe, bringing down their computer defenses and allowing him to access the data at Duelist Kingdom (in the Japanese version, he's just using the satellite to hack into the mainframe).

• The Emperor's New Groove: Invoked by the Kronk, who cuts the rope keeping a chandelier in place so it'd fall onto Yzma, who is about to win. It's comically subverted when Yzma survives because she's so thin that the chandelier's ringed font is actually wider than her.
• Phineas and Ferb: Mission Marvel: Candace, while trying to figure out how to release the Marvel Heroes' powers from a containment unit in Phineas and Ferb's spaceship, presses a Big Red Button that sends the satellite hurtling back to Earth. Fortunately for everyone, it crash-lands right on top of the villains' superweapon, foiling their plans to destroy the Tri-State Area.

• Battleship (2012): The aliens' communication ship collides with a random satellite orbiting Earth while traveling at interstellar speed and crashes into Hong Kong. Sure, it's bad for the Chinese, but the fact that the aliens don't have a ready means of letting their homeworld know that Earth is ripe for the taking is the only reason humanity even has a chance.
• Blood & Gold: Invoked Trope by Elsa via Panzerfaust shot on the church's roof. The resulting falling debris kills the SS Nazi officer about to claim the gold for himself and threatens a hidden Heinrich.
• Independence Day: The sudden cut in the satellite communications network helps tip off the earthlings that the aliens are coming.
• Man of Steel: Subverted Trope. Being a Kryptonian under the grace of Earth's yellow sun, Zod is nigh indestructible. So much, that the heavy chunks of concrete raining down on him don't cause his demise but, instead, leave him unfazed.
• Men in Black 3: The very end has one of these avert a potential asteroid strike, but seemingly only Griffin is aware of it. A close one, indeed.
• Rampage (2018): Brett's Karmic Death comes about by means of being flattened by a falling chunk of concrete. He's not remotely as threatening as his sister and surrendered all the files and data of Project Rampage, but still could have sought revenge, making it a Downplayed Trope.

By Work:

• Death Masks: Ebenezar McCoy kills a vampire who had challenged his former apprentice, Harry Dresden, to a duel (and had cheated). He did this by pulling a Soviet-era satellite from orbit and making it crash onto the vampire's compound, killing the vampire and most of his retinue (sadly it also killed the humans they fed from).
• Greg Mandel Trilogy: In Mindstar Rising, Julia Evans uses her authority to stop Event Horizon's satellite from gaining higher orbit, as she's planning to drop it on the personal yacht of a Corrupt Corporate Executive she has a grudge against. It ends up being dropped on the former communist dictator of Great Britain, when the two turn out to be involved in a conspiracy.
• Halo: The Fall of Reach: The UNSC station Cradle gets sacrificed with all its crew to absorb a Covenant barrage.
• Sky Masters: A Chinese destroyer is about to nuke the city of Davao. Fortunately, the Americans neutralize it by dropping a satellite right on top of it.

• Lovecraft Country (2020): Played With. As a sort of Rasputinian Death, the Big Bad Wannabe and evil cult leader Samuel Braithwhite dies by means of falling debris after he was already turned to stone. Safe to say, he won't be sacrificing people in rituals anymore, much to Atticus's relief.
• The Untamed: Anti-Villain Jin Guangyao dies during the Guanyin Temple collapse triggered by Nie Mingjue's spirit, whom he had murdered earlier in the plot. This reliefs Lan Xichen of the threat posed by Guangyao.

• The Crüxshadows: The plot of the story concept in Telemetry of a Fallen Angel, in which it's implied the "save" is in a spiritual/metaphorical as well as literal sense.

• Criminal Case: World Edition: Subverted in "Case 53: Politically Incorrect". After President Hewett requests proof that SOMBRA exists so he can consider taking action, Elliot tries to bring BØB out of space and use its hard drive full of SOMBRA information to prove it, but unfortunately, it gets hacked and taken away from the Bureau before it can touch ground.
• Cyborg (2007): A satellite acts as an Orbiting Particle Shield that protects the characters from an attack.
• DemonStar: Larger ships that leave a lingering wreck for 2 seconds before exploding a second time will damage all hostile targets caught in the second explosion. This is exemplified in SM2 level 1, with the first wave of Giant Mooks positioned so that their second explosion usually destroys a follow-up flight of regular-sized mooks.
• Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft: Shamanic totems fall from the sky and get planted in the ground. A few of them, particularly the Earth ones, are meant for protection.
• Elden Ring Nightreign: Funnily enough, The Guardian himself is the "satellite" in question — his Ultimate Art, Wings of Salvation, is not only able to revive allies by dive-bombing them (as reviving allies is done by "attacking" them), but it also creates a protective aura around said allies within its attack radius.
• Skies of Arcadia: During the final dungeon, the Elders of the Great Silver Shrine crash their space-based home into the around Soltis to give the heroes a chance to get inside.
• Stellaris: Occasionally, an observation post around a planet with a pre-FTL civilization on it will detect an asteroid on a collision course with the planet. If you can't manage to destroy the asteroid in time with your fleets or some defense platforms, sometimes the scientists aboard the observation post will sacrifice the station to deflect the asteroid rather than allow it to harm the developing civilization.
• World of Warcraft: The Shamanic Earthgrab totem is meant to divert mob aggro toward itself, such that any spells and attacks meant for the player go to the totem, instead. The trope is inverted, however, as the Earthgrab totem sprouts from the earth instead of falling down from the air.

• Earthworm Jim: It's a bit of a Running Gag that an out-of-nowhere falling cow splats the villain of turn, incapacitating them or otherwise foiling their evil plan.
• Invincible Fight Girl: Buff Corp has an entire fleet of satellites designed to send rings and robo refs to the planet's surface whenever there is an impromptu wrestling match.
• Megas XLR: When Megas faces off against a colossal Gloft mecha, a satellite taken down by a wayward missile Coop had fired earlier crashes into the Glorft machine and deactivates it.
• Metalocalypse: In 'P.R. Klok', a big P.R. plate Dethklok brought into space (a satellite in the loosest sense of the term) collides with and diverted comet that is about to fall on a spot where Dethklok is performing.
• X-Men: Evolution: Apocalypse is running amok somewhere in Mexico, and all other X-Men around have failed to dent him. Enter the new fully evolved Magneto, cape billowing behind him. He proceeds to use his powers to slam man-made satellites into Apocalypse. Mind you, all that does is piss Apocalypse off.
• Young Justice (2010): After numerous alien incursions using zeta beam technology, the Justice League sets up a series of satellites using technology provided by Adam Strange that prevents teleportation to Earth from other worlds.