Visiting the city of Kherson downstream from the dam, Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov says over 80 settlements have been affected by the disaster
In June, the Argentine pontiff told a gathering of priests from around the world that he wanted to go to Kenya as part of his first papal trip to Africa but that the visit was "uncertain" because there were "organisational problems".
Francis did not explain further what these problems were, but was speaking two months after Somalia-based Al Shabaab Islamist militants targeted Christians during a shooting at a Kenyan university in which 148 students were killed.
The pontiff will go to Kenya on Nov. 25, before travelling to Uganda on Nov. 27 and arriving in the Central African Republic, the final stop on the trip, on Nov. 29.