Austin's homeless face snowy night

AUSTIN (KXAN) - Thomas Wilson, 50, said it was tough to tell whether the hands shaking violently in his jacket pockets were an effort to stay warm or simply a basic reaction to the unusually brisk temperatures in Austin on Thursday afternoon.

"Oh, it's just rough out here,” Wilson said. “It's freezing. Try to keep moving."

That jacket and a thin shirt were the only things fending off the brisk wind whipping up from Interstate 35. The highway’s intersection with Braker Lane is Wilson’s regular money-making spot.

"I've been out here about two hours,” he said. "Oh, my finger tips get numb, and my toes get numb."

At last count, there were more than 6,000 homeless people in the city. Many like Wilson panhandle to make a living.

After being homeless for three years, he has learned how the temperature can determine his income. When he knows it is cold, so do the drivers. Far fewer roll down their windows to spare some change.

"Maybe one every 25 cars or something like that,” he said.

His goal for the day is to make enough money to stay somewhere warm for the night. Usually, he sleeps out in the open just down the road with only tree branches overhead.

"Some of us have been lucky enough that people drop blankets off,” he said.

"But when the wind blows at night, it doesn't work,” said Donald Windrum.

Some like Windrum are lucky enough to make it downtown to a shelter like the ARCH.

"Since I'm used to this tropical climate down here, I've gotten used to this type of weather, so this is actually cold to me now,” Windrum said.

Homeless for eight years, Windrum, 42, once lived in Chicago and said he knows how to dress for the winter.

"Just layers of clothing,” he said. “I’ve got on three gloves - a baseball glove and two gloves under it. I’ve got on four jackets and four pair of pants."

Gripping his own few layers of clothing tightly with one hand and trying to support a cardboard sign against the wind with the other, Wilson remained north of downtown along the interstate as the sun went down. His sign read: “Help a guy out!”

Knowing his forecast for the night looked grim and facing the possibility of once again sleeping in the woods, he said, "I heard it may snow tonight and tomorrow, and I'm not looking forward to it."