Survivor 48 Star Eva Erickson Unpacks Seeing Jeff Probst Cry After Her ‘Autism Episode’: ‘This Moment Broke Him’ (Exclusive)

A special moment between two Survivor contestants during the March 26 episode brought tears to Jeff Probst’s eyes — something he confessed has “never happened” in 48 seasons of hosting the show for 25 years.

In an exclusive interview with PEOPLE, Survivor 48 star Eva Erickson unpacked that emotional moment, which involved her being overstimulated and having what she called an “autism episode” during an immunity challenge, followed by castaway Joe Hunter helping her “get grounded.”

“I kept failing over and over again,” Eva says of what happened during the table maze portion of the challenge, where the pressure was on her to land the final ball into a hole to save her tribe from going to tribal council.

“My brain just got put in this big cycle, and I’m stuck in a loop of ‘I can’t do it. Why can’t I do it? What’s going on?’ ” explains the Brown University PhD student. “The second that I finished all of this stress and pressure that was overstimulating me just took hold of me, and I became ungrounded, and everybody around me didn’t know what was happening.”

Eva, 24, had only told Joe about her autism, revealing her diagnosis to the 45-year-old fire captain in the season premiere, during which she informed him what to do if the competition causes her to be overwhelmed.

“Externally, it just looks like I’m screaming a bunch,” Eva says of the post-challenge moment when she was overstimulated as the camera kept panning over to Joe — who after a tribe swap is no longer on Eva’s tribe and unable to comfort Eva since tribes are not allowed to co-mingle.

Unaware that Eva was having an episode, her tribe mates swarmed her to celebrate as she continued to scream from being overwhelmed, “but they don’t know what’s going on inside my brain, they don’t know that I physically cannot control myself, I don’t have the capability to calm down here because I’m so overstimulated,” says the collegiate hockey player.

Jeff noticed Joe’s worried demeanor and, in a Survivor first, gave him permission to leave his tribe’s mat in order to console Eva.

“Joe, do you want to give her hug?” Jeff asked. Joe quickly walked over to Eva, wrapping his arms around her in a tight embrace and telling her, “You’re good. Deep breath, remember?”

“Will you hold my hands, please?” Eva then asked. Joe clasped his hands around hers, just as she had instructed him to do in the season premiere, and placed his forehead on hers, as he provided comforting hushes.

Joe asked, “Coming out of it? You want another round? Big hug around,” before squeezing her as she tearfully replied, “Yeah, you’re amazing.”

“Come back down out of it. Easy does it now. Let me see your hands again. You’re in a safe place,” Joe said before they looked into each other’s eyes and smiled. Eva responded, “I’m good, I’m good, thank you, thank you.”

Recalling the moment to PEOPLE, Eva described Joe as “my superhero.”

“This compression helps calm me down, helps bring me back, get grounded, and this just works wonders on me in a situation like that,” Eva tells PEOPLE. “And I was able to get my head out of that loop, like this loop that’s been spinning and spinning, now I’m able to break that and actually re-center myself and reset and rejoin the game.“

After Eva and Joe rejoined their respective tribes on their separate mats, Jeff asked Joe, “Why was it important for you, Joe, to reveal part of your game and go give comfort to somebody who is on the other tribe?”

Joe, a father of two, replied, “If it exposes, it exposes, but she was in need and I would want someone to treat my daughter that way if they were playing this game.”

Eva then revealed to the rest of the cast she has autism. “Please let’s take a step away from the game and understand that this is what I deal with with my autism, and everyone who has autism should not be ashamed to ask for help and ashamed to receive it,“ she emphasized.

While trying to summarize the moment, Jeff got choked up. “There is a young girl or boy just like you watching right now going, ‘Hey, mom, hey, dad,‘ ” Jeff said before becoming visibly emotional as tears formed. “Now you got me. I’m a parent too, and I do see it. Wow, this [crying] has never happened. But I see it too, and that’s why I love Survivor. I really do.”

Eva told PEOPLE how she feels about Jeff’s tearful moment.

“It was crazy seeing Jeff cry — I’d never seen that. Seeing Jeff get so emotional about the situation and thinking about his own family and his kids, that was the moment when it hit me, that this is a moment that is going to be remembered,” Eva says. “He’s seen so many people and been through so much through all of years of Survivor, and now seeing that this moment broke him, I was like, okay, this is bigger than I can imagine.”

“It was a big thing for me, realizing, wow, I am actually representing so many people here, and seeing that reflected in how Jeff reacted to this, I was like, this is going to mean so much to so many,” she adds.

Eva, who watched the March 26 episode with her family and her boyfriend, also shared a message for Joe.

“I want to tell Joe that he’s my superhero. He is an amazing man, and I am so thankful I got to meet him through Survivor, and that this is someone who, regardless of what happens in the rest of the game, he will always have a place in my heart,” Eva says. “He saw me in this hard situation — and he had the tools and knew what to do — and he acted on that.”