This may be a suprise to a parent of a single non-verbal child. They aren’t all the same. Each has their own personality, behaviors, and subtle ways of communicating. Knowing they’re non-verbal tells you almost nothing about who they are. Some autistic kids will absolutely cry for hours over seemingly minor things. Giving them the time to get themselves under controll again is the appropriate thing to do, for those kids.
I spent a decade as direct care staff, working with -I don’t even know how many kids. At least a couple hundred.
And yes kids do that. It takes time with a specific kid to recognize the difference between them having a tantrum, a meltdown, or a legitimate emergency.