2023MNRAS.520.3669G

We present $850\, \mu {\rm m}$ imaging of the XMM-LSS field observed for 170 h as part of the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope SCUBA-2 Large eXtragalactic Survey (S2LXS). S2LXS XMM-LSS maps an area of $9\, {\rm deg}^2$, reaching a moderate depth of $1\sigma \simeq 4\, {\rm mJy\, beam^{-1}}$. This is the largest contiguous area of extragalactic sky mapped by James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT) at $850\, \mu {\rm m}$ to date. The wide area of the S2LXS XMM-LSS survey allows us to probe the ultra-bright ($S_{\rm 850\mu m}\gtrsim 15\, {\rm mJy}$), yet rare submillimetre population. We present the S2LXS XMM-LSS catalogue, which comprises 40 sources detected at >5σ significance, with deboosted flux densities in the range of $7$-$48\, {\rm mJy}$. We robustly measure the bright-end of the $850\, \mu {\rm m}$ number counts at flux densities ${\gt }7\, {\rm mJy}$, reducing the Poisson errors compared to existing measurements. The S2LXS XMM-LSS observed number counts show the characteristic upturn at bright fluxes, expected to be motivated by local sources of submillimetre emission and high-redshift strongly lensed galaxies. We find that the observed $850\, \mu {\rm m}$ number counts are best reproduced by model predictions that include either strong lensing or source blending from a 15-arcsec beam, indicating that both may make an important contribution to the observed overabundance of bright single dish $850\, \mu {\rm m}$ selected sources. We make the S2LXS XMM-LSS $850\, \mu {\rm m}$ map and >5σ catalogue presented here publicly available.