Air France and KLM have been fined a combined $425,000 by the US Department of Transportation for flying dozens of Delta codeshare flights through Iraqi airspace below the altitude the Federal Aviation Administration requires.

The FAA bars US carriers — and flights sold under American codes — from cruising below 32,000 feet over Iraq, where militant activity and ground threats pose a risk to civil aircraft. Because the flights in question carried Delta's flight number under codeshare agreements, they fell under US rules even though Air France and KLM operated them.

The violations add up. Between April 2022 and November 2025, Air France operated more than 30 Delta-coded flights through restricted airspace in the Baghdad Flight Information Region, earning a $105,000 fine. KLM's record was larger: over a hundred such flights between January 2022 and May 2025, drawing a $320,000 penalty. Both cases came out of investigations by the DOT's Office of Aviation Consumer Protection.

The airlines say they planned to fly above 32,000 feet but were often instructed to descend, or refused a climb, by local air traffic controllers because of conflicting traffic. They argued the flights should qualify for an emergency exemption and that no passengers or crew were harmed. The DOT rejected that reasoning — not because pilots followed controllers' orders, but because the pattern repeated so often that the airlines should have rerouted or simply removed Delta's code from those services. Transportation Secretary Sean P. Duffy put it bluntly: compliance is not optional, and passenger safety comes first.

Both airlines have settled to avoid litigation and agreed to stop the violations. $265,000 of the fine is due within 60 days; the remaining $160,000 is suspended for a year and payable only if either airline slips up again. Air France was also found to have run Delta codeshare flights through restricted Somali airspace before October 2022, though the DOT dropped that matter after the FAA loosened its rules there.

For travellers, the story is largely reassuring: the FAA's Iraq restrictions stay in force until October 2027, and US authorities have shown they will enforce them aggressively — even against foreign airlines. If you're flying between Europe and points east on a Delta codeshare ticket, the flight number on your booking determines which safety rules apply, a detail few passengers ever consider. Anyone nervous about overflying conflict zones can take some comfort in knowing regulators are watching altitude data closely.

Practical takeaway: itineraries between Europe and Asia or the Gulf occasionally transit Iraqi airspace, and airlines weighing route choices versus cost now have a fresh incentive to reroute or re-code those flights. Watch for schedule changes on Delta-marked Air France and KLM services as carriers adjust.

Story first reported by Travel Tomorrow.