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In most pictures of an M61 Vulcan, you can see a flash suppressor (clearly not a muzzle brake, which could've made some sense to me).

Wikipedia reference image of M61 Vulcan copyright free to use as referenced on that page

Knowing that these were mostly used on US military fixed-wing aircraft, why was the flash suppressors added? On rifles, the goal is usually to prevent the operator from being blinded in low-light environments, which I doubt would be a problem for an aircraft pilot, unless I'm mistaken?

An alternate explanation would be that it's meant to make the aircraft harder to spot when firing, but I doubt that the flash suppressor would work well enough, if visual spotting during firing even is that big of a factor to take into account.

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  • Can you provide a reference image? The ones I found lack anything that I'd identify as a flash suppressor.
    – MCW ♦
    Commented Jun 5, 2023 at 14:08
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    The M61 seems to have a range of muzzle arrangements, possibly dependent on how and where it is mounted and used. There may be applications where a flash suppressor makes sense.
    – Steve Bird
    Commented Jun 5, 2023 at 14:14
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    A pilot can be blinded by muzzle flash, no problem, particularly at night. Imagine a big spotlight being turned on while it is firing. Particularly on the F-15, -16 and -18, the muzzle is close to the pilot.
    – Smith
    Commented Jun 6, 2023 at 15:41

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A barrel muzzle clamp for the M61A1 Vulcan

Source: International Military Antiques website

This image shows a barrel muzzle clamp for the M61A1 Vulcan which was in an externally mounted gun pod used on a F-4 Phantom II fighter jet (since the early F-4s didn't have an internally mounted gun). In addition to acting as a barrel clamp, this particular design also serves as both a flash hider and a muzzle brake. These gun pods could be mounted under the wings or on the underside of the fuselage (or both). When you're mounting them under the wing, there's a chance that they'll be visible from the cockpit when firing so flash might be an issue.

An image of the pod can be found on Flikr: F4 Phantom Vietnam War fighter jet undercarriage gatling gun pod - Mr Freek

The later F-4E Phantom models had a nose mounted M61 which featured a simpler type of barrel clamp without the flash hider.

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  • This answer doesn’t explicitly answer the "why" of the question.
    – breversa
    Commented Jun 8, 2023 at 14:08

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