diff --git a/app/gateway-api/src/orchestrator/gatewayOrchestrator.ts b/app/gateway-api/src/orchestrator/gatewayOrchestrator.ts
index 041d17d2..cde47afe 100644
--- a/app/gateway-api/src/orchestrator/gatewayOrchestrator.ts
+++ b/app/gateway-api/src/orchestrator/gatewayOrchestrator.ts
@@ -975,11 +975,12 @@ export class GatewayOrchestrator implements GatewayOrchestratorHandle {
             try {
                 await this.processManager.stop(name);
             } catch {
-                try {
-                    await this.processManager.delete(name);
-                } catch (error) {
-                    failures.push(`${name}: ${error instanceof Error ? error.message : String(error)}`);
-                }
+                // Deleting the definition below also terminates a process that raced with stop.
+            }
+            try {
+                await this.processManager.delete(name);
+            } catch (error) {
+                failures.push(`${name}: ${error instanceof Error ? error.message : String(error)}`);
             }
         }
         if (failures.length > 0) {
diff --git a/app/gateway-api/test/orchestratorOperations.test.ts b/app/gateway-api/test/orchestratorOperations.test.ts
index de3b7809..ece1b258 100644
--- a/app/gateway-api/test/orchestratorOperations.test.ts
+++ b/app/gateway-api/test/orchestratorOperations.test.ts
@@ -153,6 +153,7 @@ describe('GatewayOrchestrator first-class operations', () => {
 
         expect(harness.statuses).toEqual(['STOPPED']);
         expect(harness.stopped).toEqual(['sammo:che:2:game-api', 'sammo:che:2:turn-daemon']);
+        expect(harness.deleted).toEqual(['sammo:che:2:game-api', 'sammo:che:2:turn-daemon']);
         expect(harness.completions).toEqual(['SUCCEEDED']);
     });