[3] She was built at the Sudostroytelnyi zavod imeny 61 kommunara in Mykolaiv, Ukrainian SSR, and entered service in October 1938[1] with the Soviet Black Sea fleet.

Shch-213 had secret orders to sink all neutral and enemy shipping entering the Black Sea, to reduce the flow of strategic materials to Nazi Germany.

[1] Struma had left the Romanian port of Constanța in December 1941 carrying an estimated 781 Jewish refugees in an attempt to reach Mandatory Palestine.

[1] The next day the submarine fired a torpedo at the Turkish sailing vessel Adana east-north-east of the Bosphorus but again missed her target.

[8] On 15 November 2008 the submarine was discovered 12 miles (19 km) off the coast from Constanța by divers from Aquarius dive center (2 Romanian and 1 Dutch).