Originally Posted by rickair7777

No, there is a difference...

For scheduled 121, the public expects to be able to buy a ticket and not have to worry about operational details related to safety, and they expect a very high level of safety.

For charter (and 91), the customer is closer to the weeds and needs to take some additional responsibility in selecting who they fly with. It's also important that many 135/91 market segments simply cannot support 121-level safety and be economically viable... that's OK, if you want to incur a little risk in life to do a scenic helo tour or fly to a fishing lodge in Alaska that's OK, and it's not the FAA's place to tell you that you can never fly unless you meet the 121 10^(-9) safety threshold.

Same for private pilot operations, if you want ALL flying to be at 121 safety levels then only the very wealthy could ever afford private aviation, and that would require a professional crew.

Now I do take some issue with the blurring of some lines with scheduled 135, such as what some regionals are fixing to do, to get around R-ATP and age 65 limits. If they're going to run 135 scheduled ops in the paint job of a 121 major airline brand they need a giant cancer warning painted on the hull....

WARNING: This product contains flight crew members who DO NOT meet established airline safety regulations. Flight crew members (pilots) may exceed the maximum airline retirement age, and/or they may not have the necessary pilot experience to qualify to fly for regular scheduled airlines. This operation is conducted under a special waiver of established regulations, and may result in injury or death of passengers..