ATLANTA — The course is back open Sunday for the TOUR Championship in East Lake, just one day after a lightning strike from a strong storm that rolled through left six people hurt.
Billy Kramer was among them. The 46-year-old is a vendor for this year's Tour Championship and he told NBC News he was on his way back to the venue's compound when the jolt of light flashed.
"I was going there to replenish (our product) when I was approaching that part of the course...and all of a sudden, there was just this boom to my left," Kramer recounted. "It took me a split second to register that lightning had struck around there."
Kramer said the boom left people screaming and running for safety, including himself.
"I thought - as I was on the ground - that the tree was going to fall, and so I was trying to gain my balance and my composure and to run as far away as I can as I quickly as I could," he said.
When he realized the tree wasn't at risk of falling, that's when his attention turned to the scene nearby.
"I looked and realized there were several other people lying on the course," Kramer said.
He added that several other fans had surrounded them and were trying to help. So he jumped in to help, too.
"I realized my phone was in the golf cart, and I ran back to get my phone to call 911, and was trying to explain where we were on the course," Kramer said.
It was at that point that he said he realized his ankle "was killing me," so he sat down on the ground until medics arrived to treat it, along with the few other scrapes he got.
"It was actually pretty phenomenal," Kramer said of the help from first responders, who tried to keep him and all others who were hurt calm.
After performing an EKG on the course, Kramer said EMTs took him to Northside Hospital, where he was quickly checked out and released. Overall, Kramer said he feels lucky to have only suffered the minor injuries he did.
"Way luckier than it could have been," he acknowledged. "It could have been a really catastrophic event. Everyone is really lucky. I'm the luckiest, I think, of all."
Kramer said he was able to get his ankle wrapped up in a bandaged, and was back on the fairway, Sunday.
Saturday afternoon's storms produced a lightning strike that injured six people - one of them a 12-year-old child - at the TOUR Championship, which is being played this weekend at the East Lake Golf Club in DeKalb County.
At 4:17 Saturday afternoon, PGA officials suspended play, then, almost 30 minutes later, lightning struck a tree near the 16th tee.
11Alive meteorologist Samantha Mohr said that the city of Atlanta and DeKalb County were not under a severe thunderstorm warning at the time of the incident.
The people who were hurt were all struck by debris from the tree that was hit by the lightning bolt. Five people were transported to nearby hospitals for treatment. A sixth person was treated on the scene.
Late Saturday afternoon, PGA officials came on site and assessed the integrity of the pine tree that was struck by the lightning bolt. They determined that it was safe.
Tree struck by lightning at PGA TOUR Championship on Saturday
Material from NBC News was used in this report.