"a moment of silence follows as....."

Hi

I have a question about the sentence below:

"A moment of silence follows as Rachel sits and the others expect her to explain."

I am having some trouble translating this sentence into my language just because I can't find appropriate words to put instead of "follows as". If I rewrite this sentence in that way (just to show you what I understand regarding it): "A moment of silence occurs while/during the time that/at the time that Rachel sits and the others expect her to explain", does it mean more or less the same thing as the original? Or which way you natives rewrite this sentence?

Could someone please help me out?

Thanks in advance.