  We use two-dimensional, general relativistic, viscous, radiation hydrodynamic
simulations to study the impact of a Type I X-ray burst on a hot and
geometrically thick accretion disk surrounding an unmagnetized, non-rotating
neutron star. The disk is initially consistent with a system in its low/hard
spectral state, and is subject to a burst which rises to a peak luminosity of
$10^{38}$ erg s$^{-1}$ in $2.05$ s. At the peak of the burst, the temperature
of the disk has dropped by more than three orders of magnitude and its scale
height has gone down by more than one order of magnitude. The simulations show
that these effects predominantly happen due to Compton cooling of the hot
plasma, and clearly illustrate the potential cooling effects of bursts on
accretion disk coronae. In addition, we demonstrate the presence of
Poynting-Robertson drag, though it only enhances the mass accretion rate onto
the neutron star by a factor of $\sim 3$-$4$ compared to a simulation with no
burst. Simulations such as these are important for building a general
understanding of the response of an accretion disk to an intense X-ray impulse,
which, in turn, will be crucial for deciphering burst spectra. Detailed
analysis of such spectra offers the potential to measure neutron star radii,
and hence constrain the neutron star equation of state, but only if the
contributions coming from the impacted disk and its associated corona can be
understood.
